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DWIGHT l.. MOODY 

THE GREATEST EVANGELIST OF THE CENTURA 



MEMORIAL VOLUME 

LIFE AND LABORS 

OF 

DWIGHT L. MOODY 

The Great Evangelist 

CONTAINING A FULL ACCOUNT OF HIS GRAND CAREER; HJS 

REMARKABLE TRAITS OF CHARACTER; HIS WORLD-WIDE 

FAME AS ORATOR AND PHILANTHROPIST; BURNING 

ZEAL AND DEVOTION IN THE CAUSE 

OF CHRISTIANITY 

INCLUDING HIS BRILLIANT DISCOURSES ; PITHY SAYINGS; FAMOUS 

CONFERENCES AT NORTHFIELD ; GLOWING TRIBUTES 

TO HIS LIFE AND LABORS FROM THE PULPIT 

THE PRESS, ETC., ETC. 

We shall meet beyond the river, by and by, by and by ; 
And the darkness shall be over, by and by, by and by ; 
We shall strike the harps of glory, by and by, by and by ; 
We shall sing redemption's story, by and by, by and by. 

From Mr. Moody s Favorite Hymn. 

By Rev. Henry Davenport Northrop, D.D. 

Author oi " l,ife of Spurgeon", " Charming Bible Stories", Etc., Etc. 

INCLUDING A CHAPTER ENTITLED 

"MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN" 

By BISHOP WILLARD F. MALLALIEN 
Ptpfusely Embellished with Superb Engravings 

. . . NATIONAL PUBLISHING COMPANY 

No. 241 AMERICAN STREET 
PHILADELPHIA, PA. 



TWO COPIES RECEIVED, 

LJDrary of Congress 
Office cf the 

FFR 1 4 1900 

Keglstor of Copyright* 




JTEREQ ACCORDING TO ACT OF CONGRESS, IN THE YEAR 1899, BY J. R. JONES 
UN THE .OFJFICE OF THE L.ERARIAN OF CONGRESS, AT WASHINGTON, D. C. 



F.RS1 CO ' 



LC Control Number 







tmp96 027690 



PREFACE. 



Dwight L. Moody was one of the most remarkable men of 
modern times. With few early advantages he rose grandly above 
all obstacles and by sheer force of character, untiring zeal and 
stirring appeals to the hearts of the people became the greatest 
Evangelist of the century. 

For nearly forty years Mr. Moody's name has been a house- 
hold word both at home and abroad, and during this time no other 
person exerted so great an influence in the religious world. Vast 
multitudes hung upon his lips and were swayed by his over- 
whelming eloquence. The results of his labors are unparalleled 
in the history of Christianity. 

He was a giant among men, possessed of tireless energy, 

remarkable knowledge of human nature, ready tact and common 

sense, a bright and sunny disposition, and a devotion to the sub- 

Jime work in which he was engaged, worthy of the grandest heroes 

and defenders of the faith that the world has ever known. 

Mr. Moody's marvellous career is vividly depicted in this 
volume. It pictures him in his humble New England home; 
follows him to the great city where he goes to seek his fortune ; 
relates his early struggles and victories ; tells of his rare industry 
and perseverance ; and describes the humble manner in which he 
began his work that aroused the whole Christian world. 

After Mr. Moody had carried on a missionary work in Chicago 
which probably no other man could have performed, he and Mr. 
Sankey began their evangelistic labors abroad in England. This 
most interesting volume tells of the small beginnings ; the preju- 
dices finally overcome ; the rising tide of Evangelism ; the great 
multitudes ; and finally the thrill of enthusiasm that stirred Great 
Britain from centre to circumference. As we follow these devoted 
men through Scotland and Irelard and finally to London, the 
great metropolis, their career reac s more like a miracle than the 

iii 



tv PREFACE. 

actions of ordinary men. From the nobility to the denizens o{ the 
lowest slums the people were stirred by the pungent addresses of 
Mr. Moody and the Gospel songs of Mr. Sankey, his fellow-laborer. 

The history contained in this work follows Mr. Moody on his 
return to his native land, where in Philadelphia, Brooklyn, New 
York, Hartford, Boston, Chicago, St. Louis and other large cities 
and towns, his work was the wonder of all beholders and the joy 
of all Christian people. Pastors and churches were united; the 
largest buildings were secured; immense choirs were formed; 
meetings were held both week-days and Sabbaths ; and this new 
Evangelist and his work were the theme of every tongue. 

Mr. Moody was a thorough believer in educating the young. 
He knew that impressions could be made upon young people far 
easier than upon those who are older. His whole heart became 
enlisted in educational work, and he established his famous Semi- 
narv at Northfield. 

Not only did he carry on this grand institution for many years, 
but his religious conventions, held in the summer at the same 
place, became noted throughout the world and drew visitors from 
far and near. He showed himself to be a marvellous organizer as 
well as financier. 

"The Cedar is Fallen." This expressive language of the 
Bible is appropriate to Mr. Moody's death. It was like the fall of 
the majestic cedar in the forest. He labored with unabated zeal 
up to within a very short time of his departure. Never did he 
seem more earnest or eloquent than during his last services. His 
removal produced a shock throughout the religious world. Chris- 
tian people everywhere have united in hearty praise of the map 
and his glorious work. 

Mr. Sankey paid the following generous tribute to his friend 
and associate: "I consider Dwight L. Moody to have been one of 
the most remarkable men of the century, distinguished especially 
for his devotion to the cause of Christ and the preaching of the 
Gospel to the world. His character was marked by great common 
sense and devotion to his Master. To these two points I attribute 
in a great measure his wonderful success." 



CONTENTS. 

PART I. 
Life and Labors of Dwight L. Moody. 

CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

MR. MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER 17 

CHAPTER II. 

EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST 27 

CHAPTER III. 

MOODY'S GREAT MISSIONARY WORK IN CHICAGO 42 

CHAPTER IV. 

RAPID GROWTH OF MOODY'S MISSION WORK 63 

CHAPTER V. 

MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND ... 85 

CHAPTER VI. 

MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA 105 

CHAPTER VII. 

MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN 124 

CHAPTER VIII. 

FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY AT NORTHFIELD 135 

CHAPTER IX. 

MEMORIAL SERVICES IN HONOR OF MR. MOODY 154 

CHAPTER X. 

GLOWING TRIBUTES TO THE GREAT EVANGELIST 178 

v 



vi CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XI. 

PAGE 

REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY 199 

CHAPTER XII. 

WHY MR. MOODY WAS SO VERY SUCCESSFUL . 228 



PART II. 

Mr. Moody's Brilliant and Powerful Discourses. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

THE PRODIGAL SON 237 

CHAPTER XIV. 

GOD IS LOVE 247 

CHAPTER XV. 

CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD 255 

CHAPTER XVI. 

THE VICTORY OF FAITH 263 

CHAPTER XVII. 

COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM 273 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

CONFESSING CHRIST 283 

CHAPTER XIX. 

COMPASSION OF CHRIST 296 

CHAPTER XX. 

WHAT SEEK YE? 305 

CHAPTER XXI. 
TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK, , 314 



CONTENTS. vii 

CHAPTER XXII. 

PAOB 

THE SIX "ONE THINGS" 324 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER 337 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

DECISION 351 

CHAPTER XXV. 

MAN'S GREAT FAILURE 361 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD 369 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

THE TWO ADAMS . . . 375 

CHAPTER XXVIII. 

CHRISTIAN LOVE 384 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

ABOUNDING GRACE 392 

CHAPTER XXX. 

WEAK THINGS EMPLOYED TO CONFOUND THE MIGHTY ... 410 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

"THE GOSPEL" 419 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS 436 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS 444 




C/3 



PART I. 
LIFE AND LABORS 

OF 

DWIGH T L. MOODY 

CHAPTER I. 

Moody's Marvellous Career. 

FOR nearly forty years Dwight Lyman Moody has been a lead 
ing figure in the evangelical work of this country and Eng- 
land. He began his great work in i860, and it was continued 
with unceasing vigor to within a short period of his death. 

A man of sturdy frame, great physical strength and endur- 
ance, energy that seemed inexhaustible and a hearty manner 
that drew people to him, his power was felt by all classes r»{ 
people, and his achievements are the wonder of the age. 

Mr. Moody was born in Northfield, Mass., in 1837. His 
father died when he was but four years of age, leaving a large 
family in a destitute condition. At seventeen years of age he was 
given a position in his uncle's shoe store in Boston, on the condi- 
tion that he should spend his evenings at home and regularly 
attend Sunday-school. He joined church in Boston. Soon after 
he removed to Chicago and entered a boot and shoe store. 
There Mr. Moody began to labor at every opportunity among the 
waifs and ruffians of the city. He established Sunday-schools and 
missions, gathering in the little outcasts and sparing no efforts to 
start them in a better life. 

At the sessions of the Sunday-school he was all energy and 

vigor. Before long he gave up his work in the store and devoted 

himself exclusively to Christain effort. This was in i860. He 

had labored under difficulties on account of a defective education, 

and now he set to work with diligence to relieve this defect. His 
2 17 



18 MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 

eloquence and peculiar power as a preacher began to attract much 
attention. 

In 187 1, while attending a convention of Young Men's Chris- 
tian Associations at Indianapolis, he first met Ira D. Sankey. He 
induced him to go to Chicago and help him in his work, and 
afterward the two worked together with great success. In 1S73 
they crossed the Atlantic and spent some i ime in the principal 
cities of Great Britain, gaining many converts. They made a very 
successful tour of the United States after their return. Two more 
tours in Europe, spent chiefly in Great Britain and Ireland, were 
fruitful in good results. 

VAST AUDIENCES AND WONDERFUL SCENES. 

After Moody and Sankey returned from their first English 
tour in 1S75 they organized series of religious revivals in many 
parts of the United States. The}^ went to Philadelphia in 
November, 1S75, and conducted meetings, which were attended by 
immense throngs, in the old Pennsylvania Railroad freight depot 
at Thirteenth and Market Sts., which had been especially prepared 
for their work. At that time Air. Moody was a strong-headed, vehe- 
ment man, being filled with the greatest enthusiasm for his work, 
and disposed, like Whitefield of old, to shake sinners over the 
very pit of destruction. 

The Pennsylvania Railroad freight depot was at that time 
for sale. The neighborhood was dull and uninviting at night, 
comparativeh* deserted and poorly lighted. When the suggestion 
was made that the property would be temporarily renovated for an 
auditorium until the railroad company found a purchaser for it, 
there was a good deal of derision, especially over the thought that 
President "Tom" Scott was helping along the cause of religion. 
But Scott had a hearty and large way of doing things, and he told 
the men behind Moody that they could have the use of the prop- 
erty at the rate of a dollar a year, provided they were ready to get 
out at a month's notice, when the company should effect a sale. 

It was about this period, however, that a Philadelphia mer- 
chant was forming his plans to branch out in a business way. 



MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 19 

He made the Pennsylvania Railroad Company an offer for the old 
depot and became its purchaser, but before proceeding to occupy 
it he consented that the interior shonld be temporarily recon- 
structed for the great revival of which he had been one of the chief 
projectors. 

In a few weeks there came into existence an immense hall. 
Probably at least $40,000 was spent in its constrnction and equip- 
ment. The first floor of the depot was fitted np with not fewer 
than 10,000 seats with a platform big enough to hold a regiment, 
with spacious aisles and retiring rooms. The original intention 
had been to engage the Academy of Music for Moody and Sankey, 
but this was overruled by George H. Stuart, who insisted that the 
novelty of such an auditorium as the one at the depot would alone 
draw thousands. This judgment was entirely correct. 

GREAT RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIASM. 

The success of the undertaking, from the religious point of 
view, surpassed even his eager expectations. Multitudes filled 
the hall day after day from November to February ; even Presi- 
dent Grant visited it on one occasion. As many as 200 ushers were 
required to clear the aisles at the end of each service, or to guard 
the "inquiry rooms," and on some days prayer meetings were 
going on at a dozen places in the neighborhood, like Dr. McCook's 
church and Dr. Boardman's church. 

Such a swarm of sinners smitten with repentance or softened 
and mastered by the emotions of a new and sudden ecstacy had 
not before been seen since the days when George Whitefield thun- 
dered out his eloquence. Irreligious people smiled with a half- 
amused contempt ; the worldly made Moody and Sankey a butt 
for ridicule, and not at times unpardonably, when the exultation 
of converts reached the point of intense frenzy ; Kennard Jones, 
the then Chief of Police, had his hands full in regulating the 
beseiging crowds, and in thousands of homes and workshops that 
winter men and women were talking for the first time in their 
lives of "grace," "salvation" and "regeneration." It was esti- 
mated that fully twelve thousand persons were taken into the 



20 MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 

Protestant churches in and about Philadelphia as the result of 
this extraordinary season of pious exhortation. 

We instance these services simply as specimens of the great 
meetings conducted by Moody and Sankey in many places. Wher- 
ever they went it was the same story — wonderful crowds, deep 
religious fervor, vast numbers profoundly impressed, and a great 
wave of enthusiasm carrying forward all the churches on its crest. 

A MASTER OF MEN. 

Moody at that time was the incarnation of the Christian mili- 
tant. Indeed, his aggressiveness often j arred on persons of gentle 
sensibilities. His personal presence was not engaging, his voice 
was strident and his manner fierce when he was worked up to his 
highest pitch of zeal. But there was an air of fearlessness, as well 
as of tremendous sincerity, in the man ; and the power and 
mastery with which he handled the vast crowds inspired respect 
for him among men who, while having no sympathy with his pur- 
poses, were interested in the strength and originality of his 
methods. The reporters, in transcribing their notes of his 
addresses, often had a sorry time in straightening out his dis- 
jointed syntax, but this was due to his impetuous, rapid utterance. 

His simple, direct English was the language of the people ; 
it was expressed in short, burning sentences ; and it had that 
robust homeliness characteristic of the style of Bunyan. The 
effect was sometimes wonderful on the vast audiences in the sobs 
or in the ecstasy which it produced ; and usually after he had con- 
cluded, or rather, after Sankey had sung his impressive hymns, 
there would be a long procession of sinners to the " inquiry room." 

In 1878, 1883 and 1887, Mr. Moody made extended tours 
through Canada, the meetings being marked by the intense 
enthusiasm which everywhere greeted his preaching. Countless 
audiences have felt his power ; the quiet, but intense appeals of 
Moody and the thrilling songs of Sankey have influenced many 
thousands for good. After he opened his schools at Northfield, in 
1887, part of Mr. Moody's time was given to education ; he still 
found much time to devote to his preaching work. 




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MOULD'S MAKVliLLUUS LARttK. 21 

As a writer, Mr. Moody also exercised a widespread influence. 
Among his principal works have been : "The Second Coming of 
Christ" (1877) ; "The Way and the Word" (1877) ; "The Secret 
Power; or, The Secret of Success in Christian Life and Work" 
(1881) ; "The Way to God and How to Find It" (1884) ; "Glad 
Tidings" (1876); "Arrows and Anecdotes" (1877); "Best 
Thoughts and Discourses " (1877). Both as a writer and preacher 
the predominant quality of Moody's style was directness, sim- 
plicity. His sermons were largely anecdotal, but the illustrations 
were always reverent, powerful and convincing. He was especially 
fond of the parables, and his preaching was in large measure based 
upon their form and teaching. 

SCHOOLS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE AT NORTHFIELD. 

During the twelve years preceding Mr. Moody's death his 
educational work at Northfleld, Mass., grew to large proportions. 
First he opened his own home for a few young ladies, and thus 
started his young ladies' boarding school. Next he erected a 
modest building across the way ; then East Hall was built at a 
cost of §30,000. Next followed Frederick Marquand Hall, costing 
$60,000, the gift of the Marquand estate. Following was Stone 
Hall. A new library building was then erected, costing $20,000, 
and an additional dormitory, costing a like amount. Two addi- 
tional frame houses were fitted up for dormitories. These facilities 
afforded accommodation for about 300 young ladies. 

The school buildings occupy 250 acres, which are beautifully 
laid out in park and woodland, traversed by a romantic glen, 
called Bonar Glen. An artificial lake of some three acres has been 
provided at a cost of $4,000. Mount Hermon, the school for 
young men, is about two miles from Northfleld. It is beautifully 
situated on the west bank of the Connecticut river, and consists of 
400 acres, purchased at a cost of $12,500. This school was started 
with a gift of $25,000 from Mr. Hiram Camp, of New Haven. It 
was opened in the old farm building, with the addition of a wooden 
building, for a recitation hall. 

Next, four brick buildings were erected and a large dining 



22 MUUDY'S MAKVELLUUb CAREER. 

hall. But soon the school exceeded the proportions of these 
buildings, and Crossley Hall and a new dining hall was erected, 
with accommodations for over 200 additional students, and with 
halls for chapel, library, museum, etc. Over a thousand young 
men and women, representing a dozen different nationalities, have 
been trained in these schools. Mr. Moody was no fanatic. His 
extraordinary energy in religious work was accompanied with 
broad and enli'ghtened views on the subject of education, by the 
practical results of which the whole world was benefited. 

u Be good and you will be happy." This was Mr. Moody's 
motto, and he lived up to it to the time of his death. If any- one 
could have doubted this homely maxim the} T could have found 
fulfilment of its promise by looking into and studying the life of 
the great evangelist. There probably never was a man who 
accepted and practiced and instilled religion with so much cheer- 
fulness and heart sunshine as did Mr. Moody. 

THE BUSINESS OF HIS LIFE. 

His life's aim was to "never lose an opportunity to make 
somebod}^ happy," and when opportunities did not offer he made 
them. For forty }^ears Mr. Moody had been in the business of 
" making people happy." If he had expended the same amount 
of energy and ingenuity in any mercantile or professional line, he 
would undoubtedly have accumulated a fortune. Instead, he was 
as poor when he died as when he started upon the career of an 
evangelist, except for the wealth of love and reverence and grati- 
tude that rushed to him from thousands of hearts. 

Mr. Moody's success was not confined to America. In Eng- 
land he made a great stir, and the people of the London slums 
stopped and listened to this bright, fresh, hearty New Englander, 
who got down to their own level and extended a cordial, chubby 
hand in greeting, while he offered them a religion, not of sackcloth 
and ashes, but of rejoicing and thanksgiving. 

Therein was the secret of Mr. Moody's success. He rose to 
his pulpit — and it was any pulpit, regardless of place or denomi- 
nation — with a smile on his lips and in his eyes, which gave 



MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAKLLK. 23 

practical living proof of what his religion had done for him. 
Creeds did not limit the scope of his work, for it was Mr. Moody's 
contention that Christ recognized no creeds, bnt " preached the 
Gospel to all men." 

Pews were never empty and their occupants never went to 
sleep when Moody preached, and people who never went to church, 
who boast of a "religion of their own," a "moral" religion, based 
on u common sense " and "things tangible," with a comfortable 
logic behind it, went to hear Moody preach and Sankey sing just 
to get inspiration from their cheerfulness and marvel at their faith. 

STRONG AND BEAUTIFUL FAITH. 

Before Mr. Moody was stricken for the worse, Mrs. Moody, 
his wife, in speaking of him, said in response to an inquiry 
whether or not he had hoped to recover : "His faith in his recovery 
was unlimited and beautiful ; he had no thought but to recover. 
He was cheerful, and during the moments he was free from pain 
was trying to make us laugh. We allowed him to see none of his 
mail, but we could not stop him from thinking. The schools 
were a source of worriment to him. You see, the students pay 
only half the cost of tutorage, and the other half had been secured 
through Mr. Moody's efforts. 

" Something of that life ? It has been a life of work ; a work 
which he loves, a work which has made him a model for all who 
were fortunate enough to be near him. His disposition has ever 
been sweet and humble, and his character forceful and strong. 
The influence of this simple presence is wonderful. I know of no 
day or hour in Mr. Moody's life when he had ceased for a moment 
to preach his religion ; not always in words ; Scripture lessons 
are not all of his religion. It was sometimes in what he did not 
say, when most of us would have spoken, or the pressure of his 
hand, or an act of kindness which no one but the one who needed it 
would ever know. As husband and father, counselor, companion, 
guide, he has acted always in accordance with what he preaches, 
and his faith in God has helped us through many a difficulty and 
made the travel smooth over many a rough road." 



24 MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 

His death, removes from religions life a great force which 
made for the improvement of men and of society. He had his 
predecessors and he will have his snccessors. Somewhere there 
is to-day some 3 r oung man behind a connter or in a railroad office 
who will continne his work ; jnst as he took np the work which 
Finney dropped ; j nst as Finney at a longer interval resnmed 
the work before done by Wesley and Whitefield. 

Nothing is wider of the trnth than to imagine that men like 
Mi. Moody create their opportunities. They find them and 
receive them. Great religions forces alwa}^s exist in society. 
Great religions desires are there. Men are not religions because 
religions exist. Religions exist because men are religious. 
There is present in every life, however careless and however 
depraved ; however busy and however thronged ; however ignorant 
or however commonplace ; a dim, dumb desire for an interpretation 
of the universe ; a wish faint, fitful and feeble, but none the less 
real, for some word or message which will set the soul in har- 
mony, bring life in tune and in unison with its better purpose, 
free men from the chains of habit and desire and give them an 
impulse upward. 

A DESIRE COMMON TO ALL MEN. 

This wish is universal. It exists as a fact in the observation 
of every man within himself, and without in the men about him. 
Whether one accepts or rej ects the sufficient explanation that this 
is due to spiritual and divine forces, which ensphere the lesser life 
of man, it remains true as a simple fact, apparent to all, that the 
wish and desire for moral harmony between the soul and those 
things in the world about which make for righteousness can be 
observed in every nature and felt by every man. This fact is as 
demonstrable by experience and as unmistakable in its record as 
any in the round of human nature. 

Whenever any man like Mr. Moody, with sincerity, with faith, 
with earnestness and with eloquence, faces this unspoken yearning 
for deliverance from sin, the response is instant. He succeeds in 
his appeal for exactly the same reason that the original appeal of 



MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 25 

the Gospel won men when, weak and unknown, the message of a 
feeble folk of weak and stammering tongues, it was presented to 
the world of Rome. The message prevailed then because it met 
the needs of men. It prevails now because neither men nor mes- 
sage have changed. 

This primal fact, on which rests the power and might of a 
great faith, is obscured by the mass of machinery the churches 
have piled up around the message, obscuring its purpose, dulling 
its truth, dimming its light, and blunting the edge of its sword- 
like words. By the time a man has washed off the results of a 
week's work, put on his best and unfamiliar clothes, peacefully 
walked through quiet streets, entered a dim and beautiful interior, 
heard music that charms, and settled in a cushioned seat he is far 
away from the struggle and temptation, the mire and sweat, the 
sin and suffering which in his work world have made him cry 
aloud and mightily yearn for a deliverer. 

MERE FORMS ARE NOT LIFE. 

The closed pew door, the carpeted aisle, the stained glass 
window and its dim religious light, put any minister at a tre- 
mendous disadvantage in telling a man how he shall escape from 
the body of this death, whose weight he wearily drags. These 
are all valuable in preserving the church as a useful, sacred, con- 
secrated organization, within whose fold men, women and children 
already are in peace, comfort and a comfortable assurance ; but 
when it comes to deal with men whose wish for better things is 
choked and stifled by the things of this world and its clatter, these 
things move not. 

But the wiser revivalist takes the man, wearied with sin or, 
worse, wearied out of early weariness with it, in his working 
clothes, fresh from the street, the smell of the hot furnace of his 
daily life still in his garments, heavy laden with the sense of fail- 
ure which afflicts us all in our effort rightly to do an honest day's 
work honestly, and then when the revivalist in some depot or shed, 
some place where men have worked and sweated and borne the 
burdens of the world, delivers point blank a message which fits 



26 MOODY'S MARVELLOUS CAREER. 

their need and moves their inmost being, there is certain to be 
what men call a revival. 

The realit}^ of the amazing phenomena which followed Mr. 
Moody's labors along these lines it is as impossible to donbt as 
any other social phenomena. Beginning with depots, sheds and 
halls, he passed on to churches, and did there what other men 
conld not do. His technical abilities were of the highest order. 
He had a voice under perfect training and control, of amazing 
power and penetrating force. Bnt these gifts of the flesh wonld 
have been nothing bnt for his sincerity, his earnestness, and his 
conviction that every ticking second saw eternity decided for some 
sonl. He was desperately in earnest. 

A MESSAGE RIGHT FROM THE HEART. 

This filled his sonl with flame, and he had a message to pre- 
sent of self-snrrender, self-sacrifice and personal service which for 
nineteen centnries have shone from the manger abont which the 
Christian world in reverence kneels. He fonnd men weak and 
left them strong. He smote the spell of appetite. He qnickened 
weak resolntion. He filled empty lives with pnrpose. Many fell 
away. Many lost their first love. Bnt there remained a great 
mnltitnde whose lives attested that they had won what the}^ 
songht, and who through long years have been of service to their 
fellow men. 

These things he did, but in all his wonderful life nothing 
was more clear to himself or to the social observer than the fact 
that his real power lay in giving the message he had as it was 
first delivered, not hampered by the routine, ceremony and 
machinery which dull its simple, direct truth. 






CHAPTER II. 

Early History of the Great Evangelist. 

MR. MOODY'S father died when he was only fonr years old, and 
a few weeks later twins were born, leaving the widow with 
nine children to care for. The little farm upon which they lived 
was encumbered by a mortgage. Mrs. Moody, whose birthday was 
the same as his own, died in 1896, at the age of ninety. Her 
heroic struggles to keep a roof over the heads of her large family 
were greatly appreciated by her children, five of whom survived 
their distinguished brother. The noble heart of the evangelist 
never showed itself more plainly than when he referred to the 
brave woman, who struggled against privations that would have 
made many persons break up their families and send their 
children to charitable institutions. 

The early history of Dwight L. Moody was not such as to 
suggest that he would some day become the dominant personality 
of the English-speaking religious world. Northfield, the first and 
last home, regarded him as an " irrepressible, " and his widowed 
mother expressed many anxious fears as to the future of a boy so 
full of animal spirits, so reluctant to study, so impatient of con- 
trol. Dwight at first preferred farm work to the village school. 

There are many persons still living who recall Mr. Moody 
at that time of life. They say on the whole he differed little from 
the boys of his time. It was during this period of life, however, 
that his strong-minded mother planted within him those seeds of 
greatness which later bore remarkable fruit. Mrs. Betsey Holton 
Moody, the mother of the evangelist, was a remarkable woman. 
To her more than to the father was the famous son indebted. 

The sturdiness of the mother asserted itself on the death of 

her husband. In those years, when her children were young, she 

struggled nobly through poverty and hardship. To her the son 

is indebted for many of the elements that made him great. 

27 



28 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

When Dwight was seventeen years old, with his mother s 
permission he went to Boston to seek employment. His mother s 
brother was a shoe merchant in that city, and he gave his nephew 
work on two conditions : that he shonld be governed by his advice, 
and attend regularly the Sunday-school and services of the Mount 
Vernon Congregational Church. After Mr. Moody's conversion 
he applied for membership in the church. It is interesting to 
know what was thought of his future at that time. His teacher 
said that he was very "unlikely to become a Christian of clear 
and decided views of Gospel truth, still less to fill any extended 
sphere of public usefulness." 

The committee by whom his application for admission was 
considered were doubtful at first about receiving him, owing to his 
defective knowledge of the doctrines of the Church, but after 
waiting a number of months for him to acquaint himself more 
thoroughly with these doctrines, he was received. He at once 
became an energetic worker in the Sunday-school, and was noted 
for his plainness of speech in the pra}*er meeting. 

WAS ADVISED TO KEEP STILL. 

In the fall of 1856 Mr. Mood}* went to Chicago and became a 
salesman in the shoe trade. He entered the Plymouth Congre- 
gational Church, and showed his earnest spirit by renting four 
pews, which he kept filled with young men and boys. He also 
wanted to take part in the prayer meetings, but suggestions were 
given to the effect that he could best serve the Lord by keeping 
still. But Mr. Moody was not to be silenced. He asked if he 
might become a Sunday-school teacher, and was told that he could 
if he would bring his own scholars. 

The next Sunday he marched into the school-room at the head 
of eighteen ragged boys, whom he had collected during the week. 
Later he started a mission of his own in an empty tavern in 
North Chicago. His school grew so much that Xorth Market 
Hall was occupied, and John V. Farwell supplied benches for the 
scholars and became its superintendent. Largely under Mr. 
Moody's personal canvassing sixty teachers were obtained, and 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 29 

the average attendance of scholars was kept up to six hundred 
and fifty. In i860 he gave up his business that he might give all 
his time to religious work. He reduced his expenses to a mini- 
mum by doing without a home and sleeping upon a bench of the 
Young Men's Christian Association. In a short time he became 
a city missionary, and was able to assist others. 

In 1862 Mr. Moody married Miss Emma C. Revell, one of 
the teachers in his Mission School, who has been to him a true 
helpmate. Her refinement and consecrated Christian life aided 
him greatly, not only at the evangelistic meetings which she 
attended, but in the homes of the cultured, where they were ever 
welcome guests. 

"GIVE A FELLOW A CHANCE TO PRAY." 

In less than a year the attendance at Mr. Moody's school 
increased to 1000. This school became one of the most famous 
of the West. Mr. Moody was frequently interfered with in his 
house-to-house visitations by some of the rougher people, and some- 
times had to flee for his life. On one occasion, it is stated, he was 
cornered in a room by three men, who threatened to put an end to 
him. "Look here," said he, u give a fellow a chance to say his 
prayers, won't you ? " The request was granted, and he prayed 
with such earnestness for his persecutors that they quietly left the 
room, and he took to Sunday-school the children he came for. 

For a long time Mr. Moody was beset by pecuniary difficulties. 
One morning, some time after his marriage, he said to his wife : "I 
have no money, and the house is without supplies. It looks as if 
the Lord had had enough of me in this mission work, and is going 
to send me back again to sell boots and shoes." A day or two later 
he received contributions sufficient for his immediate wants. 

A church was erected for Mr. Moody in Illinois street, Chicago, 
in 1863. He preached there at the Sunday morning services and 
at Farwell Hall in the evening. At the dedication of Farwell Hall 
Mr. Moody confessed his faith that, by the Lord's blessing, a 
religious influence was to go out from there that should extend 
"through every county in the State, through every State in the 



SO EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

Union, and finally, crossing the waters, shonld help to bring the 
whole world to God." Those words of Mr. Moody's were prophetic 
of the results which were to attend his future work. The buildings 
in which he preached were burned in the great Chicago fire of 1871, 
but they were soon rebuilt. 

Up to this time Mr. Moody was little known to the public 
outside of Chicago, and even in Chicago it had been necessary for 
him to prove the quality of his character and to conquer obstinate 
prejudice. 

HIS WORK ON THE BATTLEFIELD. 

He soon became known as one of the most acceptable public 
speakers of the country, and was in constant demand at Christian 
conventions, first throughout the West and South, and then 
throughout the country. During the war he joined the work of 
the Christian Commission, and spent much of his time looking 
after the sick and wounded of both armies. At the close of the 
war he returned to Chicago and resumed his work there, soou 
having a large and flourishing independent church as the result 
of his labors among the people. After the great fire of 1871, 
which destroyed his church, the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion buildings and his home, he made arrangements for rebuilding 
the church, and in June, 1873, went with Ira D. Sankey to Great 
Britain, a visit which continued for a period of over two years, 
inaugurating one of the greatest evangelistic movements of the age. 

While there are but few people in the United States who have 
not heard of Moody and Sankey, there are not many persons who 
have heard the story of how the two great religious workers first 
met, became acquainted, and a few months later joined their forces 
and together started out into the world on the mission of saving 
souls. 

Mr. Sankey talked freely of his companion during his last ill- 
ness. There could have been no single person in the world who 
was more deeply shocked or who more keenly realized the exact 
situation than Mr. Sankey, when the sad intelligence was received 
from Northfield that Mr. Moody would probably get well, but would 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 31 

never again be able to undertake any active religious work from 
the public platform. When the man, who for almost thirty years 
had been his constant companion and most intimate friend, heard 
this decision from Mr. Moody's son, his throat filled up and tears 
slowly trickled down his face. He turned away, unable for a time 
to speak. 

Next to an announcement that his greatest friend on earth 
could not recover, no more distressing news could have come to 
the man who made famous "The Ninety and Nine," which, with 
Mr. Moody's eloquent and convincing words, has aided so largely 
in changing for the better the course of so many lives. 

FIRST MEETING BETWEEN MOODY AND SANKEY. 

The story of how Mr. Sankey first met Mr. Moody was told 
by the former upon a recent visit to Philadelphia, shortly after he 
had received the intelligence that the world had lost the services 
of one of its greatest evangelists. It was in the year 1870, that 
two young men journeyed to Indianapolis, Ind., to attend the 
International Convention of the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion. The one was Dwight L. Moody, who came from Chicago, 
111., and the other was Ira D. Sankey, whose home was at New- 
castle, Pa. 

They had heard of each other, but had never met. Moody had 
already gained some reputation as a speaker, and Sankey for his 
ability to win souls by his singing of hymns, but neither figured 
very prominently as leaders of the exercises of the convention. 
At that time Sankey was a Government officer in Pennsylvania, 
holding a commission in the Internal Revenue service — a position 
paying him something like $1500 a year. His religious work, 
until that time, had been conducted during leisure hours. 

Sankey had heard enough of Moody to make him curious to 
see him and hear him talk, and when he went to the convention he 
immediately commenced to look for the young man from Chicago. 
Arriving at the Academy of Music, where the convention was 
being held, he took a seat close to the rear of the hall. He waited 
and listened for an hour or so, but was compelled to leave the 



32 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

place without even Hearing anybody mention the name of the man 
for whom he was hunting. 

Few people seemed to know who Mood}^ was or anything 
about him. It was afterward learned that Moody occupied a seat 
near to the door and close to where Sankey was on the opening 
day of the convention. Neither took an}' very prominent part in 
the proceedings, the greater portion of the programme being 
occupied b}^ the more important speakers. 

The first meeting of the two men did not occur until a day 
or so after they had arrived at Indianapolis, and then under rather 
novel circumstances. It was announced that "Mr. Moody, from 
Chicago," would conduct a pra} T er meeting on a certain morning 
at six o'clock in a little room some distance away from the Academy 
of Music. Notwithstanding the early hour for the service, San- 
ke}' determined to take advantage of the opportunity to see and 
hear the man whom until that time he had been unable to find. 

THE GREAT SINGER THRILLS THE AUDIENCE. 

The distance to the little room where the prayer meeting was 
to be held was much greater than Sankey had anticipated, and 
the service was half through when he arrived. He found a seat, 
as he expressed it, in the " amen corner," and sat down. He had 
scarcely been seated when somebody touched him on the elbow, 
and, turning around, he discovered that he was sitting beside the 
Rev. Robert McMillen, whom he happened to know quite well. 

McMillen asked Sankey to take charge of the singing at the 
service, explaining that there seemed to be nobody present who 
could lead. At the conclusion of a very length}- prayer, McMillen 
nudged Sankey, and told him to start right in and sing. Without 
waiting for an}- further invitation, young Sankey arose and sang 
with wonderful feeling the words : — 

"There is a fountain filled with blood, 
Drawn from Immanuel' s veins ; 
And sinners plunged beneath that flood, 
Lose all their guilty stains. ' ' 

The congregation forgot to join in on the chorus, and Sankey 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 33 

finished the hymn by himself. Moody was well pleased with the 
singing during the remainder of the service. When the meeting 
was brought to a close McMillen asked Sankey to step forward 
and he would introduce him to Moody. A procession was formec 
which slowly made its way to the front of the room, where Moody 
was standing. As Sankey drew near Moody stepped ont and took 
him by the hand. 

"Where are yon from? " Moody asked. 

"Pennsylvania," replied Sankey. 

"Married or single?" 

"Married. I have a wife and one child." 

"What do yon do for a living when you are at home?" 

" I am in the Government service." 

All this time Moody had been holding Sankey' s hand. Look- 
ing down into his face with his keen black eyes he said : — 

" Well, you'll have to give it up." 

HAD BEEN LOOKING FOR HIM. 

Sankey stood amazed and was at loss to understand just what 
Moody meant by telling him he would have to give up what was to 
him a good position and one affording him a very comfortable liv- 
ing. He was so taken back for a few seconds that he could make 
no reply. Moody, however, explained what he had meant. 

"You'll have to give up your Government position and come 
with me. You are just the man I have been looking for for a long 
time. I want you to come with me. You can do the singing and 
I'll do the talking." 

Sankey by this time partly recovered from his surprise, but 
the thought of giving up a good position for an uncertainty was 
too much, and he begged for time in which to consider the matter. 
Moody asked him if he would go with him and pray over the 
question, and out of politeness Sankey consented. Moody prayed 
that Sankey would see his way clear to do as he had asked, and 
Sankey argued within himself against the proposition. The two 
finally parted and Sankey returned to his room impressed by 
Moody's prayer, but still undecided. That was on Sunday. AW 

3 






34 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

that day and night Sankey thought over Moody's words, but the 
next morning found him still inclined to stick to the Government 
position with its salary assured every month. 

Just at a moment when he was more inclined to be wavering 
than anything else, a card was brought to him. He examined it 
and found it was from Moody, and asking him to meet him at a 
certain street corner that evening at six o'clock. Without knowing 
what he was wanted for, Sankey wrote an acceptance upon the 
back of the card and returned it to Moody. Together with a few 
friends he went to the appointed place at six o'clock that evening, 
and in a few seconds Moody came along. 

PREACHING FROM A DRY-GOODS BOX. 

Without even stopping to speak, Moody walked on and into 
a store nearby and asked permission to use a store box. The 
permission was given, and Moody rolled the large box out on to 
the street corner, and then, calling Sankey aside, asked him to 
get up and sing something. Sankey complied, and after one or 
two hymns had been sung Moody crawled up on to the box and 
commenced to preach. The workingmen were just on their way 
home from the mills and factories, and in a short time Moody had 
secured a large crowd. Sankey says of him that he preached that 
evening from that store box as he has never heard him preach 
since. 

The crowd stood spellbound as the words fell from Moody's 
lips with wonderful force and rapidity. After he had talked 
for about fifteen minutes Moody leaped down from the box 
and announced that he was going to hold a little meeting of his 
own at the Academy of Music, and invited the crowd to accompany 
him there. Arm in arm Moody and Sankey marched down the 
street singing hymn after hymn as they went. The crowd followed 
closely at their heels, and the men with their dinner pails forgot 
to go home, so completely carried away were they with the sermon 
from the store box. 

Speaking of that march down the street, Sankey declared it 
to have been his first experience as a Salvation Armyist. It took 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGKLIST. 80 

but a few minutes to pack the Academy of Music to the doors, and 
Moody saw that the men in their working clothes were first seated 
before he ascended to the platform to speak. 

His second address was as captivating as the one delivered on 
the street corner, and it was not until the delegates had arrived 
for the evening session of the convention that the meeting was 
brought to a close. Sankey was still undecided when Mood} 7 
again brought up the question of their going together. However, 
he accepted an invitation to spend a week with Moody, and before 
that week was over he had sent his commission to Hugh McCul- 
lough, who was at that time Secretary of the Treasury, and a 
soldier who had been imprisoned at Libby Prison was given 
Sankey' s place in the Internal Revenue service. 

THE GREAT FIRE IN CHICAGO. 

It was during the service at Moody's church in Chicago one 
evening that the great fire occurred which destroyed so much of 
that city. The church was crowded with men and women when 
the warning rumble of the fire alarms compelled Moody and 
Sankey to bring the meeting to a sudden close. Moody's church 
was destroyed that night and some of the people who had attended 
the meeting were burned to death in various parts of the city 
before sunrise the next day while trying to save their homes. 

The two evangelists were now without a home in which to 
preach. Moody took the first train out of Chicago and made a 
hurried journey to Philadelphia, New York and Washington, and 
soon returned with sufficient money to enable his congregation to 
rebuild their church. Prior to this time Moody had received 
several letters from ministers in England inviting him to visit 
their country. It had been his desire to make a tour of the world, 
and it occurred to him that while his people were rebuilding the 
church it would be a good time to take the trip. This they 
figured they could do before the work on the new church would 
be completed. 

With just enough money to pay their passage to London, 
Moody and Sankey set sail for the old country in 1873. The 



36 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

journey across was uneventful, but when the}^ arrived at the 
other side of the water Moody found a letter stating that owing to 
the death of the men who had invited him to England, it would 
be impossible to have him make the visit. Sankey was dismayed, 
but Moody was confident that everything would come out right in 
the end. With the letter still in his hands, he turned to Sankey 
and said : " Sankey, if the Lord opens the door to us, we'll go 
through. If not, we'll go back at once to America." 

Neither had any money, and the situation was an3^thing but 
cheerful. Moody found another letter in his pocket which had 
been handed him before leaving New York, and which he had 
neglected to open. Tearing open the envelope he rapidly ran his 
eye down the letter and, quickly turning to Sankey, exclaimed : 
"Sankey, the Lord has opened the door. We'll stay." 

SMALL BEGINNINGS IN ENGLAND. 

The letter was from a resident of York, inviting Moody and 
Sankey to visit his city should they ever come to England. The 
invitation was gladly accepted, and three days later Moody and 
Sankey were holding meetings in York. The attendance was at 
first rather poor, but Moody's sermons and Sankey' s hymns soon 
had their effect, and it was not long before the meeting place was 
too small to accommodate the crowds. 

From that on they met with continued success. 

An incident that occurred shortly after their leaving York is 
of interest in connection with Moody's last illness. In their 
travels they came across the Surgeon-General of India, and 
Moody questioned him closely about the climate, etc., of his native 
country. India was one of the countries the evangelists had pro- 
posed visiting, and when the surgeon general heard of this, he 
made a thorough physical examination of Moody. 

Looking the evangelist squarely in the eyes for several seconds, 
the surgeon general said : "Mr. Moody, if you go to India your life 
will be shortened ten years. The climate will affect your heart." 

Moody was dumbfounded for a time, but quickly recovering, 
he regretfully said: "All right, then, we won't go." 




COPYRIGHT. 1900. BY GEORGE W. BERTRON 

CHARACTERISTIC ATTITUDE OF MR. MOODY WHILE PREACHING 




MISS FRANCES E. WILLARD 




BISHOP W. F. MALLALIEU 

AUTHOR OF "MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN." WHICH APPEARS IN THIS VOLUME 




From Harper's Weekly. 



Copyright, 1886, by Harper & Brother*. 



DWIGHT L. MOODY AS HE APPEARED IN 1886 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 37 

This interfered with the proposed trip around the world, but 
the two evangelists visited many other countries while abroad, 
conducting successful meetings wherever they went. The opinion 
of the Surgeon-General of India, in regard to Mr. Moody's physi- 
cal condition, was apparently correct. 

Mr. Moody, generally accompanied by Mr. Sankey, subse- 
quently made frequent visits to England and Ireland. Among 
Mr. Moody's successes on the other side of the ocean none was 
more striking than his conquest of prej udice in Oxford and Cam- 
bridge. His first service at Oxford was so disturbed by the noises 
made by the undergraduates that there were minutes when it was 
impossible for him to proceed. With wonderful tact and patience 
he persisted till he gained the good-will of his almost riotous 
audience. Before long he had won many hearts, and the impres- 
sion left upon numerous members of the University promised to 
be both deep and lasting. Like success attended his visit to 
Cambridge. 

EVANGELISTIC CONFERENCES AT NORTHFIELD. 

The influence exercised by Mr. Moody was not confined to 
his personal labors in different parts of the world, but was felt in 
many ways through those sent out from the three schools which 
he established in Northfield, and the one in Chicago. The gen- 
eral conferences of Christian workers held annually at Northfield 
under his direction were also a powerful influence in the work of 
evangelization. Widespread likewise has been the influence 
exerted by the enormous edition of the "Gospel Hymns," issued 
under the joint names of Moody and Sankey, which have now 
been sung in every quarter of the globe for a quarter of a century. 

Mr. Moody was a great builder. His first building was the 
Illinois Street Church, in Chicago, erected about 1858, for the 
shelter of his mission school and the church which grew out of it. 
His second building enterprise was the Young Men's Christian 
Association building, in Chicago, erected in 1866, the first commo- 
dious edifice for Y. M. C. A. purposes in this country. His third 
enterprise was the re-erection of the first Y. M. C. A. building, 



38 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

destroyed by fire, both known as the Farwell Hall. This also was 
destroyed] in the great fire in 187 1, and again rebuilt, mainly 
through Mr. Moody's efforts. 

The fourth and present beautiful edifice, the finest, perhaps, 
in the world, stands partly upon the original site, on land given 
by John V. Farwell. The other Y. M. C. A. buildings in f 
America for which money was raised by Mr. Moody, and in 
whose erection he was more or less conspicuous, were in New 
York, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Baltimore and 
Scranton. 

In Great Britain these buildings were erected by Mr. 
Moody's personal efforts or from the inspiration of his works : 
Christian Union buildings, Dublin ; Christian Institute building, 
Glasgow ; Carubber's Close Mission, Edinburgh, the story of which 
is not only interesting but romantic ; Conference Hall, Stratford ; 
Down Lodge Hall, Wandsworth, London, and the Young Men's 
Christian Association building, Liverpool. In addition to the above, 
are twenty or more buildings at Northfield, Mass. ; the Chicago 
Avenue Church and Bible and Institute buildings, Chicago. 

WIDE FIELD OF CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR. 

The death of Dwight L. Moody brought sorrow to thousands 
of hearts not only in his own country, but in Great Britain and 
Ireland, which were also the scenes of his fruitful labors. A self- 
made man, without what are considered the advantages of birth 
and education, by his strong personality, his ardent zeal, his stern 
sincerity, and his undaunted perseverance, he became a striking 
figure in religious work. His first endeavors, as we have seen, 
were in the direction of gathering children into the Sunday-school, 
an enterprise in which he was eminently successful. Realizing 
that in every community there were many grown persons who 
who attended no religious exercises, and permitted si oth and indif 
ference to blind them to their moral obligations, Mr. Moody- 
determined to devote himself to the task of attracting such persons 
to the practice of virtue in their everyday lives, and to feel sub- 
mission to the commands of conscience. 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 39 

He did not seek to found a sect, but to preach the Christian 
Gospel in the broadest sense, leaving to his hearers their own 
choice of denomination when they felt impressed with the necessity 
of identifying themselves with the work of the Church. 

In company with Ira D. Sankey, Mr. Moody visited many 
cities in the United States and Great Britain. Everywhere they 
met with eventual success, although frequently they were obliged 
to overcome obstacles placed in their path by prejudice against 
evangelism. While they addressed themselves chiefly to men 
who were non-church members, thousands of Christian men and 
women, affiliated with the various denominations, attended the 
Moody lectures and contributed to the effective results of the 
same. These outpourings of the people were a magnificent 
tribute to the zeal of Mr. Moody for God's glory, and their effec- 
tiveness was demonstrated by the new life given to the church 
work of the religious organizations everywhere. 

HE SOLVED A HARD PROBLEM. 

The problem of all ministers of religion is how best to reach 
"the masses," the general body of the people. Sermons delivered 
to church-goers, to the ready and willing worshipers, form a part 
of the Church's mission, but not the whole. The sheep that are 
not in the fold call for the shepherd's care. Mr. Moody went out 
into the world, the highways and byways, offered his hand to the 
stranger, and brought him within the influence of religious teach- 
ing. He encouraged men to be good and to do good, and shewed 
them that even in a material way, they that walk uprightly are 
blessed. Impressive he was and convincing ; and it was not so 
much his magnetism as his sincerity that drew hearts to him and 
the cause to which he had consecrated himself. 

The world is poorer for his going, but richer for his life, and 
thousands are blessing God, and will bless Him through all 
eternity for the message which they heard from this man. He 
was plain and simple, almost homely, in his appearance and his 
manner. There was no great eloquence in his speech, as men 
reckon eloquence, nor majesty in his stature ; yet he drew people 



40 EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

as by a miracle, because be was so true, and because be bad a 
message. It migbt be said of bim, as was said long ago of Jobn 
tbe Baptist : " He did no miracle, but all tbings be spake of Jesus 
were true." 

Tbe "summer scbools" beld in tbe quiet little town of Nortb- 
field, bave made it famous all over tbe world, and bave accom- 
plisbed more tban can easily be calculated for tbe growtb of tbe 
Cbristian religion at borne and abroad. 

Mr. Moody never received money for bis services, altbougb 
be accepted gifts for tbe work be was carrying on. It is said tbat 
a friend cared for bis wants, and left bim free to preacb and work 
unbampered by tbe perplexing alliances wbicb bave often crippled 
aggressive workers. And so, fearless, and unbound by anytbing 
save tbe bonds of bis love for bis Master, be labored on until tbe end. 

RAISED FROM HUMBLE LIFE. 

It is a wonderful story, tbe life of tbis farmer's boy, tbis 
mecbanic, tbis uneducated, yet true and inspired teacber. Perbaps 
all tbe lessons can be bardly told so soon after bis ended career. 
But surely tbere are some wbicb are evident, and wbicb tbis age 
certainly needs to learn. 

First, be was strongly sincere and fearless. His religion 
meant everytbing to bim, and bis faitb, tberefore, was great. It 
is tbe "ligbt, balf believer of a casual creed," as Arnold expressed 
it, wbo is full of besitation and trembling, and makes little bead- 
way. Honesty of religious belief will always impress men. 

Second, Mr. Moody was direct. He bad little patience witb 
tbe sopbistry of tbeological tbeories ; but be knew tbat tbe world 
was sinful, and tbat Cbristianity could belp it, and tbat consti- 
tuted bis creed and was tbe basis of bis preacbing. And we can 
assure ministers to-day tbat wbile men are careless of so called 
dogma, and bate empty formalism, tbey will listen and profit by 
tbe old story of belp and comfort and godly living taugbt by 
Jesus of Nazaretb. Otbers can fill cburcbes as well as Mr. Moody 
filled bis balls, if only tbey are wbole-bearted, and bave a simple 
Gospel message. 



EARLY HISTORY OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 41 

Third, he was a man, "the noblest work of God." He might 
have been more learned in books ; a college education is good. 
He might have been more polished in social ways, though he 
always had a little contempt for refinements of social distinction. 
But he was big minded, big hearted, brave, instinctively a gen- 
tleman of the highest type, and these great possessions gave him 
influence. 

That influence will live, as all such influences must live. 
Would to God we had more such men, for the world needs them ! 
Meanwhile, regardless of sect or creed, or no creed, all men will 
feel the loss of such a man, and will count themselves as fellow 
sorrowers with the Northfield family in the little white house by 
the roadside, under the shadow of the old "Round Top," dear to 
tens of thousands. 

HIS FAR-REACHING INFLUENCE. 

The religion "of the heart" may occupy a less conspicuous 
place in American life than formerly, but, in view of the steady 
growth of D. L. Moody's influence, it can hardly be said to fill a 
smaller one. His last audience, at Kansas City, was said to be 
his largest in this country. But the evangelist's share in works 
for righteousness was by no means confined to the reach of his 
voice in his latter days. Every summer men of learning and 
culture flocked to his Massachusetts school to learn from this plain 
shoe-clerk the secret of fixing the Word in men's minds. So it is 
probable that his dying day saw far greater multitudes under the 
sway of his teachings than did the period of his greater vogue as 
a "revivalist." 

With the average American, life has become a much more 
complex thing to-day than it was even twenty-five years ago. 
There are many more things for men and women to do, to talk 
about and to write about, but it does not follow that we have 
dropped any of our "fifty religions " or the practice of the princi- 
pal branches thereof. Yet we hear lamentations of the " decline 
of faith " because no popular preacher occupies as prominent place 
in the public regard as did D. L. Moody in his prime. 



CHAPTER III. 

Moody's Great Missionary Work in Chicago. 

D WIGHT L. MOODY, preacher of the Gospel and powerful 
to move men's hearts, found his inspiration in Chicago, 
and Chicago mourns his passing away as few men's deaths are 
mourned. "The greatest man of his generation, a true lover of 
God and humanity, a mighty evangelist," ministers of a dozen 
creeds agreed in calling him, while men of the world, remember- 
ing his homely speech, his simple doctrine, his power over human 
emotions, echoed the verdict and wondered, sorrowing, if another 
Moody would ever rise to stir and win the world in like manner. 

It was in the old North Market Hall, standing where the 
Criminal court towers coldly now, that the dead evangelist found 
his tongue forty }^ears before he died and began to persuade his 
fellows to live lives patterned after Christ's. In Boston, where he 
had gone in 1854, a shy lad of 17, to work in his uncle's shoe 
shop, he had joined the Congregational Church, but had been 
advised that his gift was in silence, not in praying or speaking 
out in meeting. His life on the farm at Northfield had been col- 
ored by grinding poverty. A common school education had been 
denied him by the necessity of labor. 

When he came to Chicago, two }^ears later, to sell shoes and 
give his free hours to the Lord, he contented himself with much 
study of the Bible, and the gathering of poor children into a mis- 
sion Sunday-school at Van Buren and Dearborn Streets, where 
there were other teachers, to instruct them. J. V. Farwell, Sr., 
who knew Mr. Moody in his youth better than any other man in 
Chicago, called him a "Sunday-school drummer" when telling of 
his early work among the poor of Chicago. 

" He used to canvass the district south of Van Buren Street 
for children," said Mr. Farwell, "getting them out of bed on 
Sunday mornings, washing and dressing them and hurrying them 

42 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 



43 



to the mission by 9 o'clock." Teaching he did not attempt nntil 
he entered the larger field of the poor district jnst north of the 
river, and began a series of Sunday meetings for boys in the old 
Market Hall in 1858. 

Mr. Farwell was superintendent of the first Moody Sunday- 
school in the Market Hall. They had the hall rent free, but it 
always took a deal of cleaning to fit it for the gathering of boys, 
which increased every Sun- 
day. In two years the school 
grew to 1,500 pupils. In 
December, 1860, Abraham 
Lincoln, then President-elect, 
visited the Sunday-school and 
made a brief speech to the 
boys. 

"If you listen to what is 
taught you here," Mr. Lincoln 
said, "and obey the teachings, 
you will become good men. 
One of you may become 
President of the United 
States." 

Mr. Moody depended for 
his sermons on visiting cler- 
gymen and theological students. One night the preacher failed 
to appear, and the young puritan, flinging off the bonds he had 
put on himself, gave the boys a gospel talk. They clamored for 
more Moody sermons. Their parents came to listen. Mr. Moody 
had found his tongue. The theological students got a long vaca- 
tion, and the great evangelist began to know his own power of 
stirring souls. 

A church grew up beside the Market Hall Sunday-school. A 
building 100 by 50 feet was erected on Illinois Street, near Rush, 
in 1864, and there the congregation worshipped until the great fire 
of 1871, which left the Moodys — Mr. Moody had taken for wife in 
£862 a Chicago girl — penniless. A mission had been planted at 




Mr. Moody at the Age of Seventeen: 
As he appeared when he left home for Boston. 



44 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

Chicago Avenue and LaSalle Street. It, too, was destroyed. 
Within a week, however, a temporary building of pine boards, its 
roof of tarred paper, was erected, and the great evangelist had 
gathered his scattered flock about him. In 1872 a permanent 
building was begun. The Chicago Avenue church celebrated 
its thirty-fifth anniversary only a few hours before its famous 
founder died. 

Meanwhile, Mr. Moody's fame as an evangelist spread 
throughout the land, and had reached England. In 1873, in 
answer to an invitation from Liverpool, Mr. Moody went abroad, 
taking Ira D. Sankey with him. He induced the singer to join 
fortunes with him. For a year before leaving Chicago the two 
men had worked together at Chicago Avenue church and in Far- 
well Hall, the Madison Street headquarters of the Y. M. C. A., of 
which Mr. Moody was secretary and general manager. Landing 
in Liverpool, they found that the two men who had asked them to 
to come to England were dead. Without friends or introduction 
of any sort, the Americans in two years swept Great Britain like 
firebrands. 

IMMENSE MEETING IN LONDON. 

Mr. Farwell, who was in London during the closing months 
of the Gospel campaign, tells of one meeting in Agricultural Hall 
at which 25,000 persons were present, while as many more sought 
vainly for admission to the great building. 

"I don't know of any other man," said Mr. Farwell, "who 
has preached the living Gospel of Jesus Christ to as many men 
and women as did Dwight L. Moody." 

Mr. Moody returned to Chicago in the fall of 1875. The 
half-built Farson block, at 236 to 252 Monroe Street, now occu- 
pied by the United States Rubber Company, was roofed over and 
turned into a tabernacle for the homecoming of the evangelist. All 
winter he preached to audiences ranging up to 10,000 persons, 
among other things raising $100,000 to pay the losses incurred by 
the struggling Y. M. C. A. in two disastrous fires. 

The Chicago Avenue church was placed firmly on its feet 




HON. JOHN WANAMAKER-A CO-WORKER WITH MR. MOODY 




REV. T. De WITT TALMAGE 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 45 

with the royalties from the English issues of Mr. Moody's books 
and the Moody and Sankey " Hymns." In all Mr. Moody devoted 
\ooo to the establishment of the Chicago Avenue congregation. 
For the founding and support of the Bible Institute to train young 
men for the ministry, which he started October i, 1889, he raised 
upwards of $400,000. 

After his return from England in 1875 the whole country 
claimed Mr. Moody. With Mr. Sankey, he went up and down 
through the United States, taking multitudes into his confidence 
and leading them to God. He preached in an old freight depot in 
Philadelphia. In New York he preached in Madison Square Garden. 
In later years in Chicago he filled the Auditorium to the aisles of its 
topmost gallery. Later lie devoted himself particularly to the two 
schools which he established at Northfield and Mount Hermon, 
which had for their nucleus a dozen boys lie brought back from 
England in 1875, engaging to find them a home. 

UNPARALLELED CIRCULATION OF GOSPEL SONGS. 

He found time to write several books in the intervals of his 
preaching, and his sermons were published in volumes. The 
"Gospel Hymns and Sacred Songs," which he wrote with P. P. 
Bliss and Mr. Sankey, is said to have reached a circulation of 
20,000,000 copies and to have realized $1,250,000 in royalties. 
This money was received by a committee, who applied it to various 
religious purposes. None of it went to Mr. Moody, who asked no 
price and would take none for his labors. 

All his royalties for years have been equally divided between 
the two institutions. In 1899 they amounted to $20,000. In the 
Chicago Avenue Church and Bible Institute, he took an intense 
interest, directing the affairs of both, finding money for their 
necessities. 

Mr. Moody served as a sort of chaplain-at-large to the Union 
armies during the war of the rebellion. He was at the battles of 
Shiloh, Pittsburg Landing and Murfreesboro, served through the 
Chattanooga campaign, and marched into Richmond with the 
vanguard of Grant's conquering army. In the captured city, and 



46 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

earlier in the hospitals, Mr. Moody nursed and preached, teaching 

friend and foe alike to love him. During the Spanish-American 

war he worked at Tampa, Chickamauga, Jacksonville and Camp 

Alger. He would have followed Shafter's corps to Santiago, but 

for the protest of his pr^sician. 

His last address in Chicago was at th^ Bible Institute, Nov. 

10, 1899, while he was on his way to Kansas City, where the first 

collapse came. In October he conducted his last "campaign 

against sin" in Chicago, preaching at the First Baptist Church, 

the Western Avenue Methodist Church and the Chicago Avenue 

Church to immense gatherings. His throat failed him Oct. 5, 

and he was compelled to abandon the Friday and Saturday 

meetings. 

THE EVANGELIST AT THE WORLD'S FAIR. 

Mr. Moody's most notable work in Chicago in recent years 
was done during the summer of the World's Fair. He made a 
special effort to reach the multitudes that poured into the city 
from all parts of the world, the best known ministers of England 
and the continent coming to Chicago to talk to the thousands 
whom his meetings attracted. During most of the summer he 
held daily or bi-weekly union services in eight churches, two 
theatres, five tents and a dozen mission halls, besides continuing 
the regular work of the Bible Institute. On Sundays the attend- 
ance at the various meetings frequently reached 50,000. 

Chicago mourned for Moody in the midst of its Christmas 
preparations. Many prominent Chicagoans paid high tributes to 
the dead evangelist. Some of them follow : 

Dr. William Macafee, pastor of the First Methodist Church 
of Evanston : " For more than a quarter of a century he was one 
of the most useful men and one of the greatest religious forces in 
the Christian world. On questions of Biblical criticism he was 
not considered an authority. No manner of protest will check 
the advance of truth. One thing his life makes very clear, and 
that is that no vital part of the Gospel is affected by the criticisms 
of the times. All that is necessary for the salvation of men 
remains unimpaired." 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 47 

Dr. Henry Wade Rogers, president of Northwestern Uni- 
versity : u The whole Christian world will learn with profound 
regret of the death of Dwight L. Moody. He was a power for 
good, and his influence has led thousands of men and women to a 
saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. That he was a remarkable 
man we must all agree ; that he was a good man no one will deny; 
that he accomplished splendid work must be conceded. In his 
death the Church suffers a severe loss. The carping critic, who 
thinks it is a badge of superiority to assail, he did not escape. 
But no one ever questioned the purity of his life or the integrity 
of his character or his earnestness of purpose. He did a 
good work and a greater than any of his detractors. He has 
passed to his reward. I am sorry that we are not to look upon 
his face again." 

GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

Amos W. Patten, Professor of Biblical Instruction at 
Northwestern University — " I think that there is no doubt 
but that the universal verdict of the people will be that 
Dwight L. Moody was the evangelist of the century, if not of 
Protestantism of modern times. He certainly has done a vast 
work in bringing people to comprehend the simple basis of the 
Christian life and leading them to read the Bible and to believe it 
as God's message to men. He has not simply been a preacher, 
but he has been an organizer. The Y. M. C. A. in this country 
can never repay the debt to Moody for the inspiration which he 
has given to its work. He has done a great deal to unite the 
churches, to bring them to a common basis of evangelical work. 
We shall never forget Moody's downright earnestness, his simple 
faith and his large-hearted Christian character." 

Dr. Frank W. Gunsaulus — "Mr. Moody was a Christian in 
every sense of the word. He lived in the Gospel ; he felt it and 
he was an earnest evangelist. He preached in the midst of the 
doubt of the Nineteenth century, and he carried conviction to the 
heart. His religion was the Bible, and he was blessed with a 
power to move men to think of the teachings of that book. His 



48 WORK IN CHICAGO, 

life was a magnificent triumph, standing upon the most important 
facts of all the ages." 

Dr. Emil G. Hirsch — " While it is a fact that I did not agree 
with the doctrines of Mr. Moody, I always admired him for his 
earnestness and the intensity with which he preached his religion. 
He possessed an element of intensity that is missing altogether 
too much from the orthodox churches of to-day ; there is too much 
intellect and too little heart. He put his heart into his work, and 
for that I have also admired him." 

Dr. Jenkin Lloyd Jones — " Mr. Moody tried to fit the old 
theology with the modern humanity and to reconcile the ethical 
and social problems of the day with a rather non-ethical scheme 
of salvation. He was a representative of the old evangelists, but 
instead of appealing to the fears in men of God he appealed to 
their love. He was an earnest and a remarkable man." 

A MAN OF GREAT ENERGY. 

Dr. W. C. Gray, Editor of the' 'Interior"— " Energy was the 
trait of Mr. Moody, and he showed it when he began evangelistic 
work here in Chicago thirty years ago. He was earnest in all 
things and possessed of great intensity. He knew human nature 
and he knew the Bible, and he had the power and the force to 
combine the two effectively. He knew how to appeal to men and 
to convince them of the truth of the Bible." 

The Rev. William A. Burch, pastor of the South Park Ave- 
nue Methodist Church — " The death of Mr. Moody is a blow to 
the religious world. He was a power, and his earnestness won 
men and caused them to think of those things he said. He was 
energetic, too, in his work, and by his very force of character con- 
vinced every one of his earnestness and his faith in the Bible." 

Dr. H. C. Jennings, Western Methodist Book Concern — "In 
common with the rest of the world I regret the death of one of 
the most earnest workers in religion that the world has ever 
known. Mr. Moody accomplished more for religion than perhaps 
the world will ever know." 

Dr. John H. Boyd, Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 49 

of Evanston — " Nature was kind to Mr. Moody. Her gifts were 
main- and large. Divine grace so perfected and directed Nature's 
endowments as to make him a most masterful personality. His 
evangelistic labors, his writings, his schools, evidence this power. 
But there are things which he did more significant than these. 
He created a new method in Christian effort and in himself sup- 
plied the ideal. He has influenced the style of preaching for a 
whole generation. He has created a school of thought and given 
an emphasis to truth which teaches the very essence of religion, 
and will impress the Christian world more and more." 

Dr. Herbert Fisk, Northwestern Academy — " Mr. Moody 
seemed to me to be the greatest evangelist of modern times. He 
was pre-eminently a lover of righteousness and turned many to 
righteousness. He will be one of those who will shine as the 
stars." 

The Rev. P. H. Swift, First Methodist Church, Englewood— 
" The world has lost a great and a good man. He was a power in 
the evangelistic world, and has brought many souls to Christ." 

THE WORLD LOST A FRIEND. 

The Rev. H. Francis Perry, Englewood Baptist Church — 
" The church and the Christian world have lost a very dear friend. 
Only Sunday W. P. Hall, of New York, who occupied my pulpit 
at both services, told of Mr.! Moody's greatness. Prayers were said 
that he might be spared to us, but God has willed it otherwise." 

The Rev. George R. Wallace, Pilgrim Congregational 
Church — " I am much pained to hear of Mr. Moody's death. The 
sinner has lost his best and dearest friend." 

The Rev. H. Atwood Percival, Normal Park Presbyterian 
Church — " Mr. Moody's life work was for Christ. His place will 
not be filled very soon." 

The Rev. C. G. Kindred, Church of Christ, Englewood— 
" Moody's death is a nation's grief. The church world will miss 
him very much. " 

John V. Farwell — " Mr. Moody was a great man — a man of 
tremendous ability and energy. If he had gone into trade he 



50 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

would have achieved as great success as iu preaching the Gospel. 
If he had been a politician, he might have been President of the 
United States. Humility was his platform. Good, strong, com- 
mon sense his unfailing guide. His modesty was unusual. Only 
once have I heard him speak of his own preaching or its effect 
upon his hearers. Then he told of a sermon he preached in a 
church in the north of London. He said a stone wall seemed to 
rear itself between him and the people. He could not break it 
down, and at last, with a sinking heart, he asked those who wished 
to be Christians to stand up. More than half the throng responded. 
Afterward he learned that a bed-ridden old woman of the parish 
had prayed that good might come of his visit, and he took the 
thing as a lesson against pride in his own powers. He believed 
that not he, but God, working through him, wrought the marvel- 
ous conversions attending his preaching. And always he preached 
God's love for man — not hell." 

DESCRIPTION OF A TRUE EVANGELIST. 

Mr. Moody once gave a reporter his idea of what an evangelist 
should be. He said : "The work is varied and a great variety of 
men is needed for it. We need scholarly evangelists and we need 
evangelists who come out from the common people, but every man 
to succeed must have common sense, an unblemished character, 
consecration, large sympathies, love for his fellowmen, faith, 
patience, enterprise, energy, familiarity with the word of God, and, 
most of all, the baptism of the Holy Ghost. Briefly, the ideal of 
the evangelist must be the preaching of the simple Gospel in the 
power of the Holy Ghost and the coming in actual contact with 
the people." 

His advice to the working people of Chicago in 1893 was : 
" First of all, seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness ; 
believe in His promise, which I have never known to fail, that all 
things will be added unto them ; second, to pray to God for work ; 
third, to be as patient as possible during times of hardship ; fourth, 
to look earnestly for work ; fifth, take any honest employment that 
offers itself; sixth, study economy." 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 51 

The news of Mr. Moody's death brought grief to the Bible 
Institute. Classes went on without interruption, but sorrow hung 
over the big building at 80 Institute place, and the students and 
children made no secret of their tears. The Rev. R. A. Torrey, 
Director of the Institute, left for Northfield to attend the funeral 
services. Dr. Torrey declared that Mr. Moody's death would 
make no difference in the conduct of the Bible Institute. 

" We have lost our leader and a loving father," he said, "but 
the institute will be able to continue its work, though we will sorely 
miss Mr. Moody's counsel and assistance. We own the buildings 
and I have faith that we will be able to enlist support enough to 
eke out our insufficient endowment. Mr. Moody was beloved by 
every man or child who knew him. That was part of his power 
— the love he had for every one of God's creatures, though the 
greater part was, I believe, the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. He 
was humble as a child, though his wonderful energy and dominant 
personality sometimes made him seem self-assertive. His gospel 
was the gospel of God's love." 

MR. SANKEY'S HEARTFELT TRIBUTE. 

In the magazine "Success" Ira D. Sankey, the co-laborer and 
friend of the great evangelist, has this to say of him : 

"I consider Dwight L. Moody the most remarkable man of 
the century, distinguished especially for his devotion to the cause 
of Jesus Christ, and the betterment of the world. His character 
is marked by great common sense and by the utmost sincerity, his 
heart by singleness of philanthropic purpose, and his life by the 
tremendous power of achievement. His work has resulted in the 
conversion of hundreds of thousands of men and women in the two 
great English-speaking nations, England and America, marking 
him as the greatest religious general of his day. I believe his 
name will be held in everlasting remembrance by millions of the 
best people in the world." 

Ira D. Sankey, associated with Mr. Moody for many years in 
his evangelical work, when he learned of Mr. Moody's death, 
said: 



52 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

"Mr. Moody was the greatest man the country has ever seen. 
He was a God-fearing man and a God-like worker, never too tired 
to continue his work in the vineyard of the Lord. I visited North- 
field ten days ago. There I found Mr. Moody in so critical a con- 
dition that the physician would not permit me to see him. There- 
fore I knew he was very ill, but I did not expect his death so soon. 
I am sorry that I did not see him before his death in order that I 
might have gotten his last message to the world. 

" Mr. Moody and I were together for twenty-seven years. 
We met at a Y. M. C. A. in Indianapolis and arranged at that time 
to begin our evangelical work. We traveled together throughout 
this country and later went to Europe. While in London we 
preached to an audience of 17,000 on one occasion. The largest 
assembly which we secured in this country was in Philadelphia, 
where 11,000 persons congregated to hear us in the old John 
Wanamaker building. 

HIS FAVORITE HYMNS. 

" Mr. Moody was a man full of energy and good work. He 
was a loyal friend. His favorite hymns were ' When the Mists 
Have Cleared Away' and 'The Ninety and Nine.' " 

The Rev. Wilbur Chapman, pastor of the Fourth Presby- 
terian Church, New York, who knew Mr. Moody as intimately as 
any man, was deeply touched by the news of the evangelist's 
death. 

Mr. Chapman said : " He was the most lovable man I ever 
knew, and aside from my own father he filled a larger place in my 
heart than any other man. His chief characteristic was his hon- 
esty. He was the most genuinely honest man I ever knew and as 
sincere a man as ever lived. 

"He had perfect confidence in the word of God, and never 
took any stock in the so-called ' higher criticism.' The only time 
I ever saw him angry was when he was discussing the utterances 
of one of these critics. He could read a man through and through 
and was as keen a judge of human nature as I ever knew. 

"He believed thoroughly in prayer. I knew his secret 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 53 

Christian life, and I saw him before and after his sermons and in 
times of perplexity, when he talked to God as freely as my own 
children talk to me. He had perfect confidence. 

"On one occasion he needed a sum of money — $5000 or 
$10,000 — to complete the Mount Hermon School, and he sat down 
and wrote for the money to a man in a large city which I will not 
name. He knew that no human means would induce this man 
to give the money. Before sending the letter he took it to his 
chamber, placed it in a chair, and kneeling, prayed over it as only 
Moody could pray. 

"The letter reached the man at breakfast. He read it and 
threw it aside as preposterous. But there was something peculiar 
about it, and he read it again, and a third time, and finally went 
to his library and wrote the check, sending it in a letter in which 
he explained the circumstanses and said he hastened to write 
before he went to his office for fear he might change his mind. 

PRACTICED WHAT HE PREACHED. 

" Mr. Moody practiced what he preached. He never did a 
mean thing in his life, and if he injured another unwittingly he 
was the first to make it right. He believed in the second coming 
of Christ, but he did not wish to give his belief prominence, 
because he did not think fads should be put forward." 

Bishop I. N. Joyce, of the Methodist Church, said, in regard 
to the death of Mr. Moody : 

" I had known Mr. Moody for twenty-five years and had met 
him on many occasions. He was one of the purest and truest 
men I ever knew. He was a most thoughtful and careful student 
of the Bible, and seemed to understand the different departments of 
that book and know how to use them with great effect among his 
congregations. He was a great friend of young men, and his 
influence over them was remarkable. He was a devoted and labori- 
ous worker, and so far as I know the money he received nearly all 
went to aid poor young men or struggling colleges or churches. 

"Mr. Moody was a remarkable reader of human nature, and 
seemed intuitively to understand how to apply the truth to men 



54 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

in keeping with their disposition and nature. He was also a 
good writer. He wrote many books upon different subjects 
relating to Bible doctrines, and many of them have been translated 
into foreign tongues and circulated in lands beyond the sea. His 
Gospel songs, also, which he and Mr. Sankey published, have been 
translated into nearly all languages and have had a marvelous 
effect. I have heard his songs sung by natives in their own 
tongue in China, Japan and Korea. The church of Jesus Christ 
has lost one of the most effective workers it ever had in the death 
of Mr. Moody." 

Dwight L. Moody was one of the remarkable men of the cen- 
tury. Few religious leaders exercised so deep an influence over 
the lives of such large numbers of their fellow-beings as did this 
great evangelist. In his power over men Moody has been likened 
to the apostles who went forth to preach the Gospel in the early 
days of Christianity. He was much like the early Christians in 
his simple, sincere faith, in his democratic instincts that led him 
to look upon all men as brothers, and in his unselfish devotion to 
the cause of religion. 

HIS OWN BELIEF WAS FIRM. 

Moody was able to convince men because of his own unflinch- 
ing belief in what he had to say. He furnished a conspicuous 
example of the power of faith to effect results. The faith alone, 
however, might not have been so mightily effective but for the 
keen human sympathy of its possessor which enabled him to 
understand men and the ways of reaching them. He was no 
respecter of persons. His mission was to rich and poor alike. The 
democratic spirit of the Gospels took deep hold on him, not as a 
mere academic conception, but as a reality, and in consequence he 
was enabled in turn to acquire and retain a strong hold on the 
people. Added to his other qualities was the gift of sound com- 
mon sense, which preserved him from the errors into which men 
of strong religious convictions oftentimes fall. His characteristic 
frankness of manner and directness of statement were charming to 
all who came in contact with him. The pathetic and the humorous 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 56 

in Moody's anecdotes were so blended as to entertain and to 
influence the emotions of his hearers almost at the same time. 

Moody was a power in two continents. Whether on the 
whole he had most influence in America or in Great Britian one 
conld hardly say. Moody began his cosmopolitan career in 
Chicago. It was there that he discovered himself and began to 
find out the power that was in him. It was there that he learned 
how to meet men, how to deal with all sorts of people, how to get 
others to work, how to get people to work together. He gained a 
prime part of his real education in Chicago, a part of it in the 
army during the war of the rebellion, a part in conventions held 
in Illinois and in all sections of the country, and was himself in 
in process of education to the end. An expansionist from the 
beginning, he went in 1873 to Great Britian, where he conducted 
for two years the most remarkable campaign of evangelism of the 
century. Eminent Scotchmen, like Henry Drummond, who were 
in the best position to know, declare that the visit of Moody and 
Sankey to Scotland made " nothing less than a national epoch." 
It was a similar impression which this movement made in Lon- 
don, in Manchester and other cities of England. 

MADE REMARKABLE DISCOVERIES. 

Moody was in a way one of the greatest of modern discov- 
erers. He seldom went anywhere without discovering some young 
man or some woman over whom he exerted a decisive personal in- 
fluence at a critical moment, and indicated an open door to some 
peculiarly effective career. A multitude of such persons might 
be mentioned on both sides of the Atlantic who have since made 
their own mark in all the professions in almost all parts of the 
world. Mr. Drummond himself was one of these. It was Moody's 
influence over him which proved to be the making of him. If it 
had not been for Moody it is doubtful if Drummond would ever 
have been heard of. As it is, Drummond' s influence has probably 
been on the whole quite as great on this side as on that side of the 
Atlantic. 

After Moody was first in England he was in constant 



56 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

communication with many of the most influential clergymen and 
Christian workers and educators there. Every summer for many 
years he had his own interdenominational, interstate, national and 
international "parliament of religion" in connection with his 
Northfield "conferences." At these delightful and enthusiastic 
educational camp meetings Moody was always the dominating 
personality, inspiring every one with something of his own spirit, 
thus multiplying his own power, in part at least, a thousand times 
over and in all directions. 

A MAN OF LEVEL HEAD. 

He never made any serious mistakes. There was no flaw in 
his character. He commanded an absolutely universal respect. 
Rich and poor, high and low, learned and illiterate, cherished 
almost exactly the same feelings toward him. The kind of influ- 
ences which he began to put forth in Chicago forty years before 
went on growing and extending to the day of his death — and 
as the tidings of his death were borne to every part of the Eng- 
lish speaking world, his influence seemed to be greater than 
ever. It is not an exaggeration to say that the twentieth century 
will be in certain pervasive and vital respects appreciably different 
from what it would have been were it not for the distinctive spiri- 
tual and moral forces which Moody imparted and put forth. 

It is interesting to trace the early history of the man who has 
filled so large a space in the religious life and activity of the uni- 
versal Church, especially the accounts given of his conversion, 
and his entrance upon his unparalled career of usefulness. 

Scores of stories about the conversion of Mr. Moody have been 
published. Mr. Edward Kimball, through whose influence Mr. 
Moody was converted, thus tells of that event : 

"To tell the story correctly I must go back of the important 
event a few weeks to Thanksgiving day many years ago. A 
Thanksgiving family dinner party was assembled at the Moody 
home, which was on a farm a mile and a half from Northfield, 
Mass. At the table among others were Samuel and Lemuel Hol- 
ton of Boston, two uncles of the Moody children. Without any 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 57 

preliminary warning young Dwight, a boy of about seventeen, 
spoke up and said to his Uncle Samuel: 'Uncle, I want to come to 
Boston and have a place in your shoe-store. Will you take me?' 
Despite the directness of the question, the uncle returned to Bos- 
ton without giving his nephew an answer. When Mr. Holton 
asked advice in the matter from an older brother of Dwight, the 
brother told his uncle that perhaps he had better not take the boy, 
for in a short time Dwight would want to run the store. 

MORE FOND OF FUN THAN OF BOOKS. 

"Dwight was a headstrong young fellow who would not study 
at school, and who was much fonder of a practical joke than he 
was of his books. His expressed desire to go to Boston and get 
work was not a jest that the boy forget the day after Thanksgiv- 
ing. The two uncles were surprised when one day in the follow- 
ing spring Dwight turned up in Boston looking for a job. His 
Uncle Samuel did not offer him a place. Dwight, when asked how 
he thought he could get a start, said he wanted work and he 
guessed he could find a position. After days of efforts aud meet- 
ing nothing but failures, the boy grew discouraged with Boston 
and told his Uncle Lemuel he was going to New York. The uncle 
strongly advised Dwight not to go, but to speak to his Uncle Sam- 
uel again about the matter. The boy demurred, saying his Uncle 
Samuel knew perfectly well what he wanted. But the uncle 
insisted so that a second time the boy asked his Uncle Samuel for 
a place in his store. 

" ' Dwight, I am afraid, if you come in here, you will want to 
run the store yourself,' said Mr. Holton. ' Now, my men here 
want to do their work as I want it done. If you want to come in 
here and do the best you can and do it right, and if you'll ask me 
when you don't know how to do anything, or, if I'm not here, ask 
the book-keeper and, if he's not here, ask one of the salesmen or 
one of the boys, and if you are willing to go to church and Sun- 
day-school when you are able to go anywhere on Sundays, and if 
you are willing not to go anywhere at night or any other time 
which you wouldn't want me or your mother to know about, why, 



58 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

then, if you'll promise all these things yon may come and take 
hold and we'll see how we can get along. Yon can have till Mon- 
day to think it over.' 

"'I don't want till Monday," said Dwight ; "I'll promise 
now." And yonng Moody began work in his nncle's shoe store. 

" A remark the boy's nncle made afterward will give an idea 
of the yonng man's lack of education at this time. The uncle 
said that when Dwight read his Bible out loud he couldn't make 
anything more out of it than he could out of the chattering of a 
lot of blackbirds. Many of the words were so far beyond the boy 
that he left them out entirely when he read and the majority of 
the others he mangled fearfully. The young man came on Sun- 
day to the old Mount Vernon church to Sunday-school. He told 
Superintendent Palmer who he was and asked to be placed in a 
class. The superintendent brought Dwight to the class I was 
teaching and he took his seat among the other boys. I handed 
him a closed Bible and told him the lesson was John. 

IGNORANT OF THE BIBLE. 

"The boy took the book and began running over the leaves 
away at the first of the volume looking for John. Out of the 
corners of their eyes the boys saw what he was doing and, detect- 
ing his ignorance, glanced slyly and knowingly at one another, 
not rudely, of course, you understand. I gave the boys just one 
hasty glance of reproof. That was enough ; their equanimity was 
restored immediately. I quietly handed Moody my own book 
open at the right place and took his. I didn't suppose the boy 
could possibly have noticed the glances exchanged between the 
other boys over his ignorance ; but it seems from remarks made in 
later years that he did, and he said in reference to my little act in 
exchanging books with |him that he would stick by the fellow 
that had stood up by him and who had done him a good turn 
like that. 

"Then came the day when I determined to speak to Moody 
about Christ and about his soul. I started down to Holton's shoe 
store. When I was nearly there I began to wonder whether I 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 59 

oil ght to go just then during business hours. And I thought 
maybe my mission might so embarrass the boy that when I went 
away the other clerks might ask who I was, and when they learned 
might taunt Moody and ask if I was trying to make a good boy 
out of him. While I was pondering over it all I passed the store 
without noticing it. Then when I found that I had gone by the 
door I determined to make a dash for it and have it over at once. 
I found Moody in the back part of the store wrapping up shoes in 
paper and putting them on shelves. I went up to him and put 
my hand on his shoulder, and as I leaned over I put my foot upon 
a shoebox. I feel that I made a very weak plea for Christ. I 
don't know just what words I used nor could Mr. Moody tell. I 
simply told him of Christ's love for him and the love Christ 
wanted in return. That was all there was of it. It seemed the 
young man was just ready for the light that then broke upon him, 
and here, in the back part of that store in Boston, the future great 
evangelist gave himself and his life to Christ." 

ALWAYS ATTACHED TO CHICAGO. 

Mr. Moody was a Chicago man. It was there that he passed 
the days of his early humiliation. Chicago scarcely recognized 
his worth until he had gone abroad and captivated the British Isles. 
If he had had a small soul he would never have darkened the doors 
of Chicago again. But he was more generous than most men and 
never lost his attachment to the scenes of his early struggles and 
small beginnings. 

Mr. Moody's claim to greatness did not rest on his intellectual 
strength, but on his goodness. The standard of his character was 
his unqualified and immovable faith in God and in the Bible. 
With this faith he combined simplicity, honesty, sincerity, humil- 
ity, zeal, an abhorrence of egotism, and a broad charity. 

Most men would concede offhand that Mr. Moody was not an 
intellectual giant. Yet he had a commou sense so sturdy that it 
seemed almost identical with intellectual power. His energy also 
was abounding. It reached out for the greatest things in his line 
of work and accomplished them all. No man ever secured easier 



60 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

access to the consciences, to the confidence, and to the pnrses of 
his fellow-men. No man ever so deliberately tnrned his back on 
opportunities for growing rich. His books and his sermons are 
read and admired over the whole earth. In all this there is no 
proof of intellectual supremacy, but there is proof of something 
equally worthy and far more beneficent. 

As a speaker he reached larger audiences than any man of 
his generation. As a Christian educator, he has founded four 
institutions of learning of more than national influence. As a 
friend, he was the personification of Great-Heart, Henry Drum- 
mond declaring him to be the " biggest human I have met." As 
a husband and father, no one was ever more devoted, and though 
his own life was lived in the glaring searchlight of the public eye, 
his home was preserved sacred to domestic j oys. 

NOTHING OBSCURE ABOUT HIS MESSAGE. 

Mr. Moody knew his Bible, and he knew men. If he chose 
to shut out from his mind the distractions of theologians and the 
by-paths of literature, it was because he knew these were not 
essential to his peculiar mission. In the midst of doubt and con- 
fusion he towered above his contemporaries as one who knew and 
spake with authority. His message was as clear to the common 
mind as to the educated. He never got above the ordinary man, 
the plain man of the shop, the farm or the factory. He refused 
all titles and preserved to his death the simple "Mr. Moody." The 
thousands of dollars handed him by wealthy men for use in his 
Christian enterprises, never appeared in personal gratification in 
any way, and even the $1,125,000 which he received in royalties 
on his books, were used by him in the extension of Christian edu- 
cation and evangelistic work. 

Avoiding even the appearance of seeking money, he published 
evangelistic literature for all classes at prices so low scarcely an}^ 
publisher would have ventured to duplicate them. The most pro- 
fitable of all his publications, the Moody and Sankey Hymns, 
became so as if by the intervention of Providence. During his first 
tour of Great Britain, Mr. Moody tried publisher after publisher 



WORK IN CHICAGO. 61 

in London, offering- all kinds of terms, even to making the prepa- 
ration of such a book of hymns a pure gift to the one who would 
publish it in book form. Without exception, they refused, and 
Mr. Moody published it at his own expense. No other book 
except the Bible, has attained a larger circulation, and the returns 
have been used in building up the Bible schools and for other 
charitable objects. 

The story of Mr. Moody's rise from poverty to world-wide 
influence is one of the most romantic Providence ever displayed in 
the history of men. Faith and human effort have seldom been 
more closely joined. Mr. Moody was slow in finding his sphere, 
but when he found it, he made giant strides. His entrance into 
business in the boot and shoe store of his uncle in Boston, his 
arrival in Chicago in 1856, as a clerk at nineteen years of age, 
later acting as a salesman in boot and shoe stores, are facts suf- 
ficiently familiar, as is also his starting up a small business for 
himself. Why he did not continue in business, and the different 
steps which led him into his life work, are not so generally known. 

GREAT IN HIS SIMPLICITY. 

It is doubtful whether even Mr. Moody's closest friends fully 
realized the simplicity — the simplicity which always characterizes 
greatness — the earnestness and absolute sincerity of the man. 
These, united with that strange power we call magnetism, formed 
a combination absolutely unique in the modern religious world. 
Perhaps London's great preacher, Spurgeon, was the nearest 
parallel that can be cited, but his limitation, was indicated in the 
fact that London, and not the world, claimed his efforts. Mr. 
Moody was known in London, in Edinburgh, and in San Franciso 
almost as well as he was known in New York or the other leading 
cities of the United States, excepting Chicago. Chicago had the 
closest personal knowledge of the man and his work, and there 
were no more sincere mourners anywhere at the death of the great 
evangelist than in the city to which he gave his first strength in 
Christian effort. It was in Chicago that he expanded, achieved 
his first and greatest successes, learned the sources of his power 



62 WORK IN CHICAGO. 

and that secret of reaching the people in which he has possibly 
never had an eqnal. 

It is told of him that when he began his religions work his 
emplo3^er asked him how he expected to snpport himself, he replied : 
"God will provide for me if He wishes me to keep on, and I shall 
keep on till I am obliged to stop." He did keep on, and only 
death stayed that wonderful energy and zeal which have left 
snch an impress npon modern Christianity and the world. 

Starting with the proposition that the Bible and Christianity 
are trne and divine, Mr. Moody did not stop to discnss what to him 
were minor questions of religions belief, forms of worship or arti- 
cles of creeds. His creed was the Bible, his field the world. Hence 
he belonged to all chnrches in a sense that none other of the great 
preachers of the century belonged. Spurgeon was a Baptist, 
Beecher a Congregationalist, Talmage a Presbyterian, but Moody 
was content to be known simply as a Christian. 

PREACHING WAS DIRECT AND PERSONAL. 

At his work Moody was the most simple and direct of men in 
the pulpit. His preaching was always personal, and he impressed 
it individually upon the members of the congregation that his 
message was meant for them, not to be passed over the shoulder 
to the next one and so on till it got out of doors and affected no 
one. This, with his earnestness and sincerity, his wonderful 
familiarity with the Bible, the homely aptness and strength of his 
speech and illustrations, was the secret of his marvelous power. 

Moody, the Gospel preacher ; Sankey, the Gospel singer, and 
Bliss, the Gospel poet, made in the more active days of the Evan- 
gelist's work an agency that arrested and compelled the attention 
of men to their spiritual needs as no other during the century has 
done. To have been the foremost Evangelist of the United States 
was much ; to be the mightiest Christian worker of his time is far 
more, and this claim may be safely made for Dwight Lyman 
Moody. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Rapid Growth of Moody's Mission Work. 

FN spite of all discouragements, Mr. Moody kept his one great aim 
* in view, and his influence grew from day to day. People who 
at first did not know what to make of him, so uncommon was his 
zeal, soon saw that he was in earnest, was laboring not for his own 
glory, was a diamond, although a rough one, and gave him their 
confidence and support. 

He had a rare experience with the Christian Commission, 
that famous organization that did so much during the great Civil 
War for the soldiers on the battlefield. He was brought into living 
contact with men who were in such a position that they appre- 
ciated every kind word, every cup of cold water, every brotherly 
grasp of the hand, every plain and simple truth taught in the Bible, 
and every effort that was made for their welfare. Young Moody 
— for at that time he was young — not only conferred a blessing 
tipon the men in camp and field, but by mingling with men and 
laboring for them he gained a great benefit for himself. 

He became skilled in dealing personally with individuals. 

He learned how to touch their emotions, how to reach their hearts, 

how to interest them in the subject of religion, how to answer 

skeptics, and how to present plain truths in a simple way. All 

this experience and all this tuition which fitted him to be a great 

teacher he had acquired when he went back to Chicago. Very 

soon it was found that his mission school was growing rapidly and 

required a much larger building for its accommodation. It was 

plain that its borders must be enlarged in order to make room for 

the large number of poor and degraded children that were attracted 

by their friend and benefactor and were willing to attend the school 

he had established for their benefit. And so, not far from the old 

Market Hall, a spacious chapel was built in 1863, at a cost of 

about $20,000. It was considered a most remarkable financial 

63 



64 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

success that Mr. Moody was able to raise all this money by his 
own unaided efforts. 

As religious impressions were made upon these young per- 
sons and man}' of them were attracted to a Christian life, what 
church connection they should form became a serious question. 
The}' were advised by Mr. Mood}- to give their names to some 
evangelical minister in whose church they would find a home, and 
where they would be cared for. This was the best disposition, it 
was thought, that could be made of them. Any one coming from 
a Presbyterian family was advised to go to a Presbyterian min- 
ister. So with children of Methodist or Baptist or Episcopalian 
parentage. 

CONVERTS WITHOUT A HOME. 

While this plan worked very well with the daily prayer- 
meetings and Young Men's Christian Association, it failed so far 
as the North Market Mission was concerned. It has been stated 
that there was not in Chicago at that time a single church and 
congregation that would have afforded a proper home for these 
young outcasts. In this way arose the necessity for an independ- 
ent church connected with Air. Moody's work. Accordingly, all 
the ministers of the city, together with many other friends of Mr. 
Moody among Christian workers, were invited to meet in council 
for the purpose of taking into consideration the project of a new 
church that should be a home for the people, especially that class 
that had been gathered into the North Market Mission. 

There was a very good attendance and it seemed as if sub- 
stantial results would follow. On this occasion Mr. Moody was 
in excellent form and gave a remarkable address. He briefly 
reviewed his work, pointed out its prominent features, stated the 
difficulties and trials under which it had been carried on, and the 
necessities of the case at the present time. As he proceeded it 
became evident that the project of forming a new church did not 
meet with universal favor. 

One good Episcopal brother felt constrained to withdraw from 
the council, although he wished Mr. Moody's work success. 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. G5 

Among Presbyterians, Methodists and Baptists various objections 
were raised, either as to church forms or doctrines, and the result 
was that Mr. Moody's mission did not receive ecclesiastical 
endorsement. 

But for all this a church was organized for the 300 converts 
and to all intents and purposes Mr. Moody was made the pastor 
of it. He had strong support from influential men in the city, 
who believed that in reaching the lowest classes of the people and 
doing them good he was accomplishingimore than all the churches 
of Chicago put together. Feeling this, they were not backward 
in giving him their individual support. This, in many instances, 
consisted of personal labor from Sunday to Sunday, and evening, 
to evening during the week. In addition to this, sums of money 
were contributed from time to time as they were wanted. The 
North Market Mission had passed the critical period of its history 
and was now a living fact and a substantial success. 

FREE AND INDEPENDENT CHURCH. 

It is to the credit of the Congregationalists that they organ- 
ized "The Illinois Street Church" and fathered the enterprise, 
when probably but for them the whole project would have failed. 
When candidates were received into membership the ordinance of 
baptism was administered by some of the ministers present, and 
the same may be said of the communion services. It should be 
noted that this church is an independent organization and in this 
respect is entirely free and untrammeled. 

From this time on the congregation increased rapidly, and 
the work grew and became as prosperous as might have been 
expected from the efforts of the devoted band of laborers who had 
it in charge. There was a bell in the tower of the church, and it 
was a common saying in Chicago that this bell never ceased to 
ring. Meetings of all kinds were going on, and it may with truth 
be said that the place was hot with Gospel work. In addition to 
these services others were held in various places, and in many 
parts of the dark city lights were kindled. Mr. Moody was in 
the habit of overseeing all of these meetings and made it a point 
5 



66 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

as far as possible to appear in every one of them, even if it were 
only for a short time. 

One amazing featnre of the movement was the fact that it was 
never allowed to languish. There was one continuous revival. It 
is often said that when there is a period of unusual religious inter- 
est it is soon over and there comes a cold and painful reaction. 
But it was not so in this case. The altar fires were burning all 
the while and there was not a day throughout the year Vv hich did 
not witness some progress made and some victories for the Gospel. 
Other men would have become exhausted and would have been 
compelled to rest, but Mr. Moody's vast resources of physical 
strength carried him through labors under which others would 
have been crushed. Even when he thought he was weary and 
needed rest he would suddenly come forth like a giant and appear 
to be as fresh and vigorous as if he had just returned from a 
vacation. 

NOT SO TIRED AS HE THOUGHT. 

His old friend Col. Hammond mentions this instance: "Mr. 
Moody came to see me one Sunday, after his morning service, 
seeming to be quite tired out. He threw himself into a chair and 
burst out with the following exclamations : ' I am used up — can't 
think, or speak, or do anything else. There is my meeting at the 
church to-night — you must take it. I have absolutely nothing 
left in me.' 

" Knowing that Mr. Moody never asked help unless he 
needed it, I promised to take the service off his hands. When the 
time came I went down to the Illinois Street Church, and found 
the house quite full. I was about to commence the service, when 
the door opened, and in walked, or rather rushed, Mr. Moody, fol- 
lowed by a long procession of young men whom he had picked up 
in saloons and at street corners, and brought with him du an 
errand which, to them, was evidently a new one. 

" Mounting the platform with a bound, he seized the hymn- 
book and commenced, and from beginning to end of that service I 
had nothing to do but to keep out of the way. 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 67 

" It appeared that he had taken an hour or two of rest ; and 
then, having no care about the evening service on his mind, he 
took up his old familiar work of bringing in recruits, at which he 
was this time more than usually successful. As he led the way 
to church some happy thought struck him, and between the street 
corner and the pulpit he arranged a sermon, which was one of the 
most effective I ever heard him preach." 

An amusing account is given of Mr. Moody making two 
hundred calls one New Year's Day. He started out to make this 
number and succeeded in doing it. Of course he could stay only 
a short time in any one place, and his call could not exceed more 
than two minutes. He would jump from the carriage followed by 
one or two friends he had taken with him, rush into the house, 
look around and say : 

"I'm Moody ; I guess you know me. How are you all ? I 
wish you all a Happy New Year. Let us pray." 

THE YOKEFELLOWS. 

Then down he would go on his knees, and after a few words 
of supplication would spring to his feet, seize his hat and start 
for his carriage. This visit would be repeated at the next house 
and so on. Toward night the friends who were with him were com- 
pletely tired out and were compelled to go home exhausted. But 
Moody kept on and, after he had finished, seemed able to begin 
again and go through the same round. This is a striking illus- 
tration of both his physical endurance and his amazing zeal. 
Even the horses on this day were tired out, and he was compelled 
to make the last of his visits on foot, but he persevered and 
reached all the places he had on his list. 

A band of helpers was organized by Mr. Moody called the 
Yokefellows. Their business was to go out into the highways, 
to visit from house to house, to stand on the corners of the streets, 
to distribute tracts and printed invitations to the meetings at 
Illinois Street Church and at Farwell Hall. Wherever there 
were crowds of people these young men were to be found, and in 
this way Mr. Moody's work was kept before the eye of the public 



68 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

and was carried on vigoronsly. One yonng man tells how lie 
became a member of the Yokefellows and an active worker in 
the mission. 

" I was a stranger in Chicago. One Sunday morning I was 
standing at a street corner, not very far from Mr. Moody's church, 
staring about, not knowing what to do with myself or which way 
to go. Mr. Moody, who was just then sending out the Yoke- 
fellows to their morning stations, came up to me and said, famil- 
iarly : ' Here, take this pile of papers, stand at that corner, and 
give one to everybody who goes by ! ' 

" Glad to hear a friendly voice, and to have something to do, 
I took the papers, and gave them out as directed ; and I have been 
a member of that band ever since." 

WILD BOYS BECOME NOBLE MEN. 

It is interesting to trace the history of some of the wild boys 
who were gathered into the mission. It was the beginning of a 
new life to many of them. They saw the folly of a life of sin and 
debauchery ; their thoughts were turned to better things, their 
self-respect and pride were awakened and through the gracious 
influence which was brought to bear upon them they grew to be 
useful citizens and noble men. It was Mr. Moody's idea to give 
everybody something to do. Afterward he was always in the 
habit, when he went to a new place, of preaching from the text, 
"To every man his work," the aim being to stir up slumbering 
Christians to activity and thrust them out as missionaries 
wherever it was possible for them to gain a hearing or do any 
good. 

It is a matter of record that Mr. Moody was always deeply 
interested in the great organization known as the Young Men's 
Christian Association. He gave much time and labor to the branch 
in Chicago, and this, like his mission, grew on his hands until he 
did not know where to find a home for it or what to do with it. 
At first the Association was located in the Methodist Church 
block, but these quarters became too small, especially after new 
departments were organized. It was felt that a home must be 




IRA D. SANKEY 

Who Composed the Music and Sang the Inspired Song 

"there were ninety and nine that safely lay 
in the shelter of the fold, 
but one was out on the hills away, 
far off from the gates of gold— 
away on the mountains wild and bare, 

AWAY FROM THE TENDER SHEPHERD'S CARE, 
AWAY FROM THE TENDER SHEPHERD'S CARE.'' 




HON. JOHN V. FARWELL 

MR. MOODY'S MOST EFFICIENT CO-LABORER IN CHICAGO 




DR. N. P. WOOD 

MR. MOODY'S FAMILY PHYSICIAN AT NORTHFIELD, WHO WAS WITH HIM 
DURING THE CLOSING HOURS OF HIS LIFE 




REV. A. C. DIXON A. P. PITT 

MAJOR D. W. WHITTLE GEORGE C. STEBBINS 

CO-LABORERS OF MR. MOODY 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 69 

provided for the young men, and the matter of obtaining a new 
building was made a subject of earnest prayer. 

There seemed to be, however, great difficulties in the way, 
and any one with a faith less resolute would have been defeated 
at the outset and would have given up the undertaking. Still 
there was vast wealth in Chicago ; there were very liberal men 
who had large ideas of Christian usefulness ; it was only neces- 
sary that their hearts should be touched and then their pockets 
would be opened and all money that was needed would be 
obtained. 

MOODY MADE PRESIDENT. 

People were frequently turned away from the daily prayer 
meeting, and it was very evident that larger accommodations 
would have to be provided. "The only way to do this," said one 
of the brethren, "is to make Mr. Moody president of the Associa- 
tion." His success in raising money for the Illinois Street Church 
was well known. But Mr. Moody was a man of more zeal than 
knowledge — so it was thought by many; he lacked the graces and 
refinements that were thought essential to the highest degree of 
Christian endeavor ; and there were many genteel people who 
looked coldly upon him and his work. This Young Men's Asso- 
ciation was now the strongest in the Northwest. Many prominent 
men were connected with it ; they were educated, refined, capable 
of conducting public services with acceptance, and the proposition 
was to place over them in official position a young man whose 
only recommendation was that he had been successful in establish- 
ing a mission and a church for the slums. 

There was great opposition to the nomination of Mr. Moody, 
but he and his friends carried the day after a spirited, though 
friendly, contest, and it was afterward felt that no one thing in the 
history of the Association had added more to its influence and 
success. The majority of his opponents gracefully acquiesced in 
the decision, believing that if the Lord had educated him for a 
special work, this was all that was necessary and they had no right 
to interfere. 



70 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

The plan for obtaining a new bnilding proposed by Mr. 
Moody was to organize a stock company, with, twelve trustees, who 
should be responsible for erecting the new building and should 
hold it in trust. Interest at 6 per cent, should be paid upon the 
stock after the building was finished. This was to come out of 
the rentals of such rooms in the building as the Association did 
not need for its own purposes. If there was any excess of reve- 
nue this was to be applied for buying in the stock, and by pur- 
suing this plan the Association would finally be freed from debt. 
And as soon as out of debt, then the revenue was to be applied 
to extending the operations of the Association, thus keeping its 
great religious object in view. 

GREAT FINANCIAL SUCCESS. 

Now we have to state a very remarkable fact, which is that 
this young man whom many acknowledged as the president of 
the Association with evident misgivings, and almost doubted his 
capacity for anything good, soon placed stock for the new building 
to the amount of $101,000. This not only secured the erection of 
a splendid edifice, but it showed what a marvelous financier had 
the undertaking in hand. The building committee had the saga- 
city to locate the structure in the business centre of the city, where 
it would not only be accessible to everybody, but where its rooms 
would command a ready rental at high prices. Not only was 
there a reading-room, pra}^er-meeting room, committee rooms, 
offices for the various departments and employment bureau, but 
there was a large hall capable of holding three thousand people. 
In fact the building was complete in all its appointments, and could 
not have been better adapted for the purposes it was intended to 
to serve. 

It was dedicated on Sunday evening, September 29, 1867, and 
was solemnly consecrated to the service and worship of God. The 
event created an unusual stir in the religious circles of the city. 
An immense throng of people assembled, and the large platform 
was filled with prominent ministers of different denominations, all 
of whom were ready to recognize the remarkable success of the 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 71 

undertaking and wished the work of the Association God-speed. 
Public records of the day have preserved a synopsis of the address 
delivered by President Moody on this occasion. It was as follows : 

ki If there is one thing more than another for which Chicago 
is distinguished, it is the rapidity of its growth in size, wealth, and 
in the extent of its trade. But of all the great and swift successes 
which have come to us, none is more striking than that of the 
Young Men's Christian Association. 

" During the last month, while we have been getting in sight 
of the end, many a man has said to me, ' Don't get proud.' That 
is good advice. I feel, more than anything else, and more than 
ever before, that Jesus has accomplished this great result for us. 
And for this wonderful blessing I want you all to praise Him. 

MUST GO AND SEARCH FOR THEM. 

" A few years ago this Association was growing weaker and 
weaker, and at one time it came very near dying. Those who 
organized it made the mistake of supposing that if they opened 
some rooms, and gave notice of meetings to be held in them, sinners 
would come there of their own accord to be saved. But they were 
not long in finding out that if they would save the lost they must 
search for them in the byways and dark places, where they are 
hidden away from the light of Christ and His Gospel. 

" Then we began to go out and bring in. That was just what 
Christ told us to do. And now, because we have obeyed Him and 
gone to work in His way, Christ has helped us to build this hall. 
But it seems to me the Association has just commenced its work. 
There are those, indeed, who say we have reached the limit of our 
power. But we must rally round the Cross ; we must attack and 
capture the whole city for Christ. 

" When I see young men, by thousands, going in the way to 
death, I feel like falling at the feet of Jesus, and crying out to Him 
with prayers and tears to come and save them, and to help us to 
bring them to Him. His answer to our prayers, and His blessing 
on our work, give me faith to believe that a mighty influence is 
yet to go out from us, that shall extend through this county and 



72 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

every county in the State ; through every State iu the Union, and, 
finally, crossing the waters, shall help to bring the who}e world 
to God. 

" We have been on the defensive too long. It is time we 
went into the conflict with all our might, straight into the enemy's 
camp. 

" It has been said that the Association is now fairly estaK 
lished, and has all the money it needs ; but if we should begin to 
think so, it would be the death of us. When we stop trying to 
enlarge our work for the Lord and raise more money for it, we 
shall become stale and stupid, like some of the rich institutions of 
the Old World, which are settling down into indolence, and dying 
of dry rot, because they are ' full and have need of nothing.' We 
must ask for money, money, more money, at every meeting ; not 
for the support of the Association — as it now is — but to enlarge its 
operations. 

VAST MISSIONARY WORK. 

" We want to build homes for young men and for young 
women ; mission schools ; Magdalen asylums ; reformatory insti- 
tutions of various kinds ; as well as places of resort for innocent 
amusement, and mental and social culture ; so that there may be 
no excuse for our young people being caught in the traps which 
Satan sets for them all over the city." 

Somebody has said that the great mission of the Young Men's 
Christian Association is to kill sectarianism, and Mr. Moody on 
this occasion seemed to take the same ground, for he called 
attention to the fact that people of every religious name and 
denomination could become members and were all united in one 
Christian family. The enthusiasm of the meeting was very great 
and there was heartfelt rejoicing at the success of a noble under- 
taking, the object of which was to benefit the young men of the 
city and form the centre of religious enterprise, the effect of which, 
without any doubt, would be felt throughout the entire Northwest. 

The treasurer of the association at this time was Mr. Farwell, 
without whom it is hard to see how Mr. Moody could have accom- 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 73 

plished what he did in Chicago. This man was a tower of 
Strength. He was rich in heart and richer in pocket. For him to 
see a chance to do good was to do it. Mr. Moody had already 
proved his generosity, and in all the religions history of America 
there is scarcely a name that deserves more to be honored by the 
Christian public than that of Mr. Farwell, the wealthy philanthro- 
pist and humble worker of Chicago. Mr. Farwell' s address on 
this occasion was as follows : 

"Twenty-five years ago," said he, u there might have been 
seen, wending their way through the dirty streets of Chicago, a 
number of casks on wheels, distributing the waters of the lake at 
the houses of the people. A little later, a few favored ones were 
supplied with water, by means of wooden pipes, from a small tank, 
which was filled from the lake by the surplus power of the engine 
in the only flour-mill at that time in the place. 

LOCATION OF THE BUILDING. 

"Then some enterprising capitalist conceived the idea of a 
mammoth reservoir, large enough to supply the whole city, and 
the lot on which this building stands was bought by the Chicago 
Hydraulic Company as a location for it. But the rapid growth 
of the city rendered this plan inadequate, and the municipal gov- 
ernment, taking the matter into their own hands, built huge reser- 
voirs in each division, still taking the water from near the shore, 
where it was always more or less impure. 

"This system, in its turn, has been supplanted by the tunnel, 
through which pure water from the depths of the lake — an inex- 
haustible supply — is brought to the homes of our people. 

"I have thought, since these, walls were commenced on the 
very spot once selected for our central reservoir, and now to be 
dedicated as a spiritual centre, whence we trust the pure Water of 
Life shall flow in every direction, of which if a man drink he shall 
never thirst again — I have thought that God's hand was in all this, 
and that, while we bless Him for the pure water from the depths 
of the lake, we should also magnify His goodness, which has 
taught us how to pass beyond the shores of shallow and turbid 



74 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK, 

sectarianism, and draw our spiritual life from the pure depths of 
the heart of Christ, and, by means of a Christian union which 
knows no differences of church or creed, to send out that tide of 
blessing all over this great city. 

"This building is a practical demonstration of the unity of 
Christ's Church. Here we are not Baptists, nor Methodists, nor 
Presbyterians ; we are simply Christians ; and as soon as the Lord 
wills it, nothing will delight me more than to see, as the result of 
such enterprises as this, a complete and heart}^ union of all who 
love our Lord Jesus Christ — such a union as will sweep away sec- 
tarian distinctions, and make His Church a unity in diversity, 
with one pasture, one flock, and one Shepherd. 

"This enterprise, whose successful issue we celebrate to-night, 
has long been in contemplation. But only of late has any one had 
faith enough to conceive of its present proportions. It is well this 
project was delayed, or it might have been only a water-cart, 
instead of a great central reservoir." 

ADDRESS BY GEORGE H. STUART. 

At this time the name of George H. Stuart, president of the 
United States Christian Commission, was widely known. He was 
a resident of Philadelphia, a very earnest layman, a man highly 
respected in the business community, and he was the patron and 
advocate of every good cause. Mr. Stuart went to Chicago for the 
express purpose of attending the dedication of the Young Men's 
Christian Association building. The public press of the day 
recorded the rousing, enthusiastic welcome that was given him, 
the admirable manner in which he had conducted the work of the 
Christian Commission during the Civil War preparing the way 
for his hearty reception. 

He commenced his speech by saying : "I have travelled 
eight hundred miles expressly to be present at the dedication of 
the first hall ever erected for Christian young men. Let me take 
you, in thought, to a store in St. Paul's Churchyard, London, and 
introduce you to a modest business man, Mr. George Williams, 
who, in 1844, was a clerk in that house. In those days he used to 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 75 

invite his fellow-clerks to his own little room for prayer — I too 
have prayed in that room — and the result of those meetings, on 
the 6th of June, 1S44, took the form and name of the 'London 
Young Men's Christian Association.' From thence the organiza- 
tion has spread through Europe and America ; and its work, by 
all kinds of good men on behalf of all kinds of unfortunate and 
bad men, has demonstrated its usefulness and power. 

ki The Chicago Young Men's Christian Association was 
revival-born. Springing into life after the great awakening of 
1857-8, it was among the first in existence. It was also among 
the earliest and most successful missionary organizations brought 
into use in connection with the war. God has been with you. 
You have had the ' God bless you ! ' of thousands of soldiers ; and, 
now that the war is over, untold thousands of sinners out of Christ 
wait for your peaceful ministry in his name. 

"EXPECT GREAT THINGS." 

"In the year 1865 your Association attained its majority ; and 
now, with the hope of youth, and the vigor of manhood, it com- 
mences a new and splendid career, blessed with the confidence and 
supported by the beneficence of all branches of the Christian 
Church. Therefore, inscribe upon your banners the words of the 
heroic missionary Carey : ' Attempt great things for God, and 
expect great things from God.' " 

The dedication of this magnificent building was an occasion 
of great rejoicing and the friends of the Young Men's Christian 
Association throughout the country felt that a tremendous 
impetus had been given to their work. On all sides the question 
was asked, " Have you heard the good news from Chicago ? " 
Other cities followed in line, and it is gratifying to state that 
some of the finest buildings on the American continent have been 
erected at immense cost to make provision for the religious wants 
of our young men, and enable them to escape the snares and wiles, 
the traps and pitfalls so freely laid for them. 

Near the close of the meeting above referred to a name was 
given to the building, which had hitherto been without any: 



76 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

There seemed to be but one opinion as to what it should be called. 
Mr. Moody rose and said : "It was the generous subscription of 
thirty thousand dollars, by the chairman of our building com- 
mittee, which purchased this land, and gave us at the outset a 
good hope of all we see to-night. Now, by way of giving honor 
to whom honor is due, I propose that we name this building 
Farwell Hall. All in favor say ' Aye ! ' " 

A tremendous shout went up which showed the popularity of 
the man whose contributions had been so generous. Thenceforth 
the building was to be called by his name. Mr. Moody being a 
very practical man and always having an eye for chances, called 
for contributions from all persons present and his appeal met with 
a generous response. It seems a singular providence that a good 
work of this description should be interfered with by calamity. 
It was not long before the new hall was reduced to ashes and the 
splendid structure was laid in ruins. People everywhere who 
read the news were appalled, and feared lest the noble under- 
taking of providing a Christian home for young men in Chicago 
would after all be a failure. But the kind of stuff of which 
Moody and his fellow-helpers were made triumphed over the mis- 
fortune and the work went on almost as if nothing had happened. 

FAITH SUPERIOR TO FIRE AND FLOOD. 

What was to be done when all the hard labor and success of 
so many months were destroyed in an hour by one fell sweep of 
devouring names ? But faith can outlive fire or flood or disaster 
of any kind. Before the fire went out that consumed this new 
and magnificent building, the loss of which was very great as it 
was only partially insured, a new subscription was opened and 
the work of raising money to repair the damage that had been 
done was begun. Mr. Moody and Mr. Farwell were pledged to 
undertake the work and carry it through to completion. How it 
was done perhaps nobody knows ; nor is it necessary that anybody 
should know ; suffice it to say that a new home for young men 
rose upon the ruins of the old. 

Mr. Moody held the office of president of the Young Men's 




T. W. HARVEY 

PROMINENT IN MR. MOODY'S WORK IN CHICAGO 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 77 

Christian Association for four years, and might have held it 
longer if he had consented to be re-elected, but he acted as vice- 
president, with Mr. Farwell in the chair. Various devices were 
put into operation for the purpose of securing funds with which 
to pay off the indebtedness on the new building and carry on the 
work of the association. • 

Among other things a splendid banquet was given at the Tre- 
mont House, to which the ministers and leading business men of 
the city were invited. All doubtless knew why they were asked 
to be present on this occasion. They knew very well what 
Messrs. Farwell and Moody had in mind. People generally get 
in a happy, generous mood when they are eating, and on this 
occasion considerable enthusiasm was awakened over the work of 
the association and an appeal was made, first, to the stockholders 
to make a donation of stock or interest money to the association, 
and next to other persons for new subscriptions. 

TREASURY HANDSOMELY REPLENISHED. 

The plan worked admirably and a large amount of money was 
realized. Kind friends donated this supper, and while the asso- 
ciation was not out of pocket for any expense, its treasury was 
handsomely replenished to meet current obligations and to carry 
on the work of the following year. This incident of the banquet 
shows how fruitful Mr. Moody was in devising means for raising 
money. In fact, great success always attended him when he had 
under consideration the question of ways and means. 

Why was he so much more successful than others? This is 
something that was often asked and many persons were puzzled 
when they attempted to account for his financial achievements. 
Really, there was nothing mysterious about it. He was an earn- 
est man, perfectly devoted to his work, always had large schemes 
in hand for benefitting others, and thoughtful business men had 
absolute confidence in his honesty and good sense. He could get 
a million dollars when others could not get a thousand. 

There have always been in this country very wealthy Chris- 
tian families who felt that they could make no better disposition 



78 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK, 

of their property than to give it for just such, purposes as were 
represented b}^ Mr. Mood}'. It is not at all likely that He came 
an3~wnere near exhausting his resources in the matter of securing 
financial assistance for an}^ of his undertakings. One thing was 
certain to eve^body : he was not enriching himself. He could 
have left a vast fortune, but his fortune is in his great name, his 
schools for the welfare of the young, and the multitudes who were 
blessed under his ministty. He built his own monument in the 
hearts of myriads, and his name and fame will endure longer than 
marble or bronze. 

While Mr. Moody knew his own deficiencies as a public 
speaker and never sought opportunities to appear in public, many 
calls came to him, some of them from distant places where Chris- 
tian conventions were to be held. His great qualification was his 
practical sense and his experience in reaching the neglected masses. 
He was in the harness ; he knew every line of religious activity ; 
he knew just where failures had been made and what measures 
would bring success. 

READY FOR THE HUMBLEST SERVICE. 

Many ministers and others much older than himself were 
willing to sit at his feet and learn how best to attain the ends they 
all had in view. Generally at such public gatherings he was con- 
tent to fill some small unimportant place ; he did not travel a 
hundred or a thousand miles merely to show people Dwight L. 
Moody. 

An amusing instance is related of the manner in which he 
was compelled on one occasion to occupy the chief place on the 
programme of a Sunday-school convention. Announcements had 
been made far and near that unusual talent had been secured, and 
"distinguished speakers" from Chicago would be present. Mr. 
Moody started with Mr. Hawle}^, the secretary of the Young Men's 
Christian Association, who never imagined himself to be anything 
more than a humble worker, and quite incompetent to fill the posi- 
tion of a "distinguished speaker.'' The convention, which was 
in one of the counties of Illinois, was in great expectation, and 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 79 

had set apart an entire afternoon for trie gentlemen who had been 
invited from abroad to address them. 

Mr. Moody and his friend were simply scared, as they were 
f the only ik distinguished speakers" from Chicago who were on the 
ground. It should be said that they did not reach the place until 
two o'clock on the morning of a cold night, when, having learned 
the situation, the} 7 were too anxious to retire and sleep, and were 
too tired to sit up with any degree of comfort. They spent their 
time in prayer and in attempting to prepare themselves for the 
occasion. 

The morning session of the convention was dull and draggy, 
and did not seem to realize expectations. When the afternoon 
came and the two men were on their way to the church, Mr. 
Moody in passing a public school building engaged it for that 
afternoon. 

TOOK THE ROOM ON FAITH. 

His friend asked him what he wanted of that school-room. 
"I want it for an inquiry meeting after w T e get through," said Mr. 
Moody. There was no doubt whatever in his mind but there 
would be persons to attend such a meeting ; he engaged the room 
and was sure they would come. 

Mr. Hawley was to speak first, while Moody prayed for him ; 
then Moody w T as to speak while Hawley prayed. Mr. Hawley 
gave an address about twenty minutes long to the very large con- 
gregation present. Taking his seat, Mr. Moody came to the 
front of the platform and poured out such a torrent of red-hot 
words — words so full of spiritual life and vigor — that the people 
stared in surprise, and then were moved profoundly by the 
eloquence of this unlettered, rugged young giant from Chicago. 
He spoke for over an hour, and when the invitation was given for 
persons who wished to converse on the subject of religion to go to 
the school room, the place immediately filled, and about sixty of 
those who were present expressed themselves as having received 
a great blessing before the meeting closed. 

From the work of that day a revival commenced and spread 



80 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

with great power through trie county and the surrounding country. 
This experience was most valuable to Mr. Moody, as it taught hirn 
that he had capabilities for the work which he had scarcely dared 
to acknowledge before, and that an open door was set before hirn. 
He felt that his work was owned of the Lord, and that the seal of 
divine approval was placed upon his efforts. 

It was thought by some people that he acted largely from 
impulse, confounding this with inspiration. It was often feared 
that what he thought was a Divine direction or command was 
nothing more nor less than a human emotion. This, it was said, 
led him sometimes to do strange things. Still, these very things 
that were accounted strange often resulted in great good. While 
going through the State one time endeavoring to arouse Chris- 
tians to greater activity, he was riding with a gentleman who was 
taking him to the place of his next appointment. The}' passed a 
small school house, and coming to a dwelling, Mr. Mood}' stood 
up in the wagon and called aloud. 

RELIGIOUS MEETINGS ANNOUNCED. 

A woman came to the door and asked what he wanted. He 
inquired if any religions meetings were held in that neighbor- 
hood. She assured him that there were not. 

"Tell your neighbors," said Mr. Moody, "that there will be 
prayer meetings in that school house every night next week." 

Coming along to another house, they found the teacher of 
the school, and she was told to have the children announce the 
meetings and request everybody to attend. The man who was 
travelling with Mr. Moody was very much surprised, and asked 
him who was to be responsible for these services and conduct 
them. 

"You are," said Mr. Moodv. 

The man was greatly astonished and declared he had never 
done such a thing in his life. "Well," said Moody, "it's time 
you had. The appointment is made and you will have to keep it." 

The good brother found there was no way of escape and went 
and did his best. The meetings were a great success, were inter- 



GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. Si 

esting and profitable, and although started in this offhand way, 
they accomplished lasting good in the neighborhood. 

Concerning the career of the great Evangelist in Chicago 
during his early religions labors, it must be admitted that "a 
prophet is not without honor save in his own country. " Chicago 
had within its bounds a remarkable man, but did not know it. 
Growing up in their midst was a flaming herald of the Cross who 
was destined to shake the world with his invincible courage, his 
apostolic zeal, and his power of speech and Christian effort. He 
did not himself know how great he was. It is well that it was 
so, for he was kept in humility and there was no opportunity for 
pride. 

Years afterward, when he returned to the city of his first 
labors, he was the same simple, unaffected, unostentatious man 
that he had alwa}^s been. He was laying a good foundation for 
future usefulness when he began his mission work. Led step by 
step, he went forth as a conqueror, and the record of his brilliant 
career is worthy to be placed beside that of the greatest and most 
successful laborers in the vineyard. 

HARD LABOR FOR MANY YEARS. 

Moody's career was a refutation of the theory that hard work 
and the continual expenditure of energy are necessarily destruc- 
tive of health and life. While it is true that his age was only 
sixty-two at his death, and while it is possible that overexertion in 
his latter years may have hastened the end somewhat, the fact 
remains that for more than a generation he had been laboring 
with unwearied and almost incessant activity, often amid scenes 
of tremendous excitement, when the atmosphere about him was 
surcharged with emotional electricity as multitudes accepted his 
fervent invitation to renounce their sins and embrace the simple, 
unfaltering faith of which he was the uncompromising apostle. 
Vet this strain did not wreck his nerves or transform him into a 
peevish invalid. With a tendency toward broadening views in the 
final years of his life, he never lost an iota of his implicit belief in 
the gospel which he preached, and his record until fatal illness at 

6 



82 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

length overtook him beyond the threescore mile-post was an 
illustration of generally healthful and invariably cheerful man- 
hood. 

Of the value of his work in reviving popular interest in evan- 
gelical Christianity there can be no doubt. Those churchmen who 
criticised his methods were forced to admit that these were highly 
efficient in reaching and arousing the "plain people" of this coun- 
try. When Robert G. Ingersoll began his assaults on the Chris- 
tian faith, adorning his oratory with the decorations of a superb 
rhetoric, and barbing his shafts with biting satire and trenchant 
wit, many devout believers felt that a serious peril menaced the 
church. 

AN INFLUENCE THAT CANNOT DIE. 

But all the eloquence of the famous gladiator of disbelief 
failed to exert a tithe of the lasting influence over the hearts and 
minds of men which was exerted by the direct, homely appeals of 
Moody, intensified by the honest faith that was in the man, and 
aided as they were during many years by the touching harmonies 
of Sankey's voice. Together these champions of faith not only 
undid the greater part of what Ingersoirs audacity had accom- 
plished; they were potent in turning the tide in the other 
direction, and in kindling a renewal of Christian belief and 
practice. 

In the latter third of the nineteenth century the Christian 
Church was fortunate indeed in possessing so faithful, fearless and 
efficient a soldier as Dwight L. Moody. 

Moody had immense force. The fire of zeal that burned in 
him spread warmth wherever he went, kindling cooler men to 
sympathetic action. Thus it was that churches throughout the 
country welcomed his coming, they knowing that it meant a sea- 
son of enthusiasm which would long outlast his departure. He 
knew the world, he understood human nature, and had loving 
pity for it. The old saying about hating sin and loving the sin- 
ner was eminently true of him. 

Moody did a great work. Many thousands of men and 



GfcOWTH OF MISSION WOKK. 83 

women are better for his having lived. Their lifted and broad- 
ened and purified lives are the noblest of monuments to his. A 
good man, his deeds live after him to bless mankind. 

Even as a revivalist he differed widely from the old time 
revivalists of the last generation, who terrified the sinner into 
repentance by holding him over the precipice where he could see 
the lurid fires of the pit seemingly eager to envelop him. Mr. 
Moody doubtless held exactly the same beliefs as to the character 
and duration of future punishment as his predecessors did. But, 
without, perhaps, being exactly conscious of the fact, the seeming 
harshness of this dogma was softened by his profound belief in 
the goodness and love of God. It was upon that thought he most 
often dwelt, never failing to bring it in even when he referred to 
the certainty of future punishment. This characteristic of his 
exhortations separated him widely from the revivalists of the past 
and gave his teachings a much more general acceptance than was 
accorded to previous evangelists. 

AN EXPERT IN COMMON SENSE. 

Nor was that all. Mr. Moody was a man of the rarest com- 
mon sense. He never indulged in religious cant and had small 
patience with those who did. A man of the people himself, he 
knew instinctively how to reach the heart of the people. Though 
not an educated man, he was in his own line one of the most pow- 
erful and effective speakers of this generation. His style was 
terse, vigorous and cogent, and his thoughts were clothed in 
homely and simple Anglo-Saxon which it was always a pleasure 
to listen to or to read. 

A man of genuine human sympathies and at the same time 
intensely practical, he made it his object in life to preach Chris- 
tianity because he believed that Christianity was a good thing for 
men in the present world as well as the world to come. Inciden- 
tally Mr. Moody gained many honors and was able to support 
himself from his labors, but it would have been just the same to 
to him had poverty and obloquy been his reward. He had no 
selfish ends to serve. 



84 GROWTH OF MISSION WORK. 

During his last few years Mr. Moody broadened in many 
ways. He read and studied in certain lines to great advantage, 
and his acquaintance with a multitude of distinguished men and 
women in Europe and America freed him from some of the limita- 
tions of his earlier years. His work for the Christian training 
and education of boys and girls at Mount Hermon and Northfield, 
Mass., abundantly deserves the success that has come to it. And 
these excellent schools are perhaps the best monument to the great 
evangelist. His words have been the means of regenerating a 
countless number of lives, and the memory of his blameless and 
useful career will long remain an inspiration to those who knew 
him. 



CHAPTER V. 

Moody and Sankey in Great Britain and Ireland. 

MR. MOODY went twice to England, yet without attracting 
wide attention or creating any deep impression. He was 
thought to be an earnest devoted young man, but he did not at this 
time exhibit the rare power in reaching the hearts of men that 
characterized him at a later period. When he went abroad the 
third time he took Mr. Sankey with him, and the combination 
proved to be a powerful one. 

It must be said that on this trip Mr Moody had a definite 
object in view. He was not going to England to scratch around 
and see if he could find some work ; he was not going there with 
the intention of waiting, in the hope that there might be some 
opening for him that would enable him to make himself useful. 
We have said he had a distinct object in view; what was it? 

" I am going to England to win ten thousand souls to Christ." 
These were his remarkable words — words that some people would 
have thought were not only bold, but almost rash. They did not 
appear so, however, to those who knew the man. He was not, there- 
fore, an adventurer waiting for chances ; he knew exactly what he 
wanted to do, and fully intended to accomplish his object. He knew 
enough of the English character and the wide field for evangelistic 
work to convince him that once he got the right start he could 
surmount all obstacles and do a grand work. 

He had been in correspondence with a number of friends in 
different localities who favored his coming, just as they would favor 
labor of this kind performed by any earnest man. The most singular 
thing was that when Mr. Moody arrived in Liverpool with his 
friend Sankey, two of his old friends had died in the interval of 
his voyage, and a third was inclined to Relieve the time in his 
locality was not ripe for such a movement. It is of interest to 
know that Mr. Sankey hesitated about accompanying Mr. Moody, 

86 



86 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

as at this time lie had an urgent invitation from the well-known 
singer, Philip Phillips, to go with him to the Pacific Coast for the 
purpose of giving sacred concerts. A friend said to Sankey, " Go 
with Moody ; don't go with Mr. Phillips. Two workers in the same 
line, and especially two singers, are pretty sure not to agree." Mr. 
Sankey took this advice, and it is safe to say never afterward 
regretted it. 

Upon reaching Liverpool they found that the only possible 
opening was at York, the very place from which their friend, Mr. 
George Bennett, the secretary of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation, had telegraphed that the town was so cold and dead as to 
forbid any hope of success. Now, mark the characteristic spirit 
of Mr. Moody : in this instance the qualities that made him great 
shine out with remarkable clearness. How did he answer such a 
discouraging message, one that would have blocked the passage of 
almost any other man and caused to give up in despair? He 
telegraphed him instantly: " I will be in York to-night." And 
to York he went. 

A CITY SOUND ASLEEP. 

Mr. Bennett's account of the spiritual lethargy of that town was 
not overdrawn. York was dead and cold. There was no stir 
among the people, no going out to meet these heralds of the cross. 
Quietly, without noise or tumult, without blowing any trumpet, 
they reached their destination and prepared to begin their labors. 
If they had been men of little faith they would have been dis- 
heartened at the very outset. The only encouragement they found 
was the response given to their appeal for churches to be opened 
on the following Sunday. With a good deal of reluctance four 
were placed at their disposal, one Baptist, one Congregationalist, 
and two Wesleyan. 

Their first meeting on Sunda}^ morning was in the rooms of 
the Young Men's Christian Association and was attended by only 
eight persons, but they knew the Lord was not with numbers and 
they were not dismayed. That meeting of eight persons was the 
beginning of a vast and wonderful movement which swept over 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 



87 



Great Britain and Ireland and affected multitudes of people both 
among Christians and those who were not. From such small 
beginnings the grandest results sometimes flow ; the mustard seed 
becomes a tree and the fowls of the air lodge in its branches. 
Other meetings 
held on that first 
Sabbath were bet- 
ter attended and 
some progress was 
made during the 
week, but the fact 
that York, so far 
as religion was 
concerned, was a 
dismal Arctic re- 
gion was painfully 
evident. 

Mr. Moody saw 
at once that his 
preaching must be 
directed to profes- 
sors of religion, 
with the hope of 
arousing them 
from their slum- 
bers. Concerning 
these, Mr. Bennett 
said, "they needed 
almost as much 
wakin g up as the fa- 
mous Seven Sleep- 
ers themselves." Probably at no time during the career of the 
evangelists were they so sorely tried and so beset with discourage- 
ments as during the early part of their labors at York. In the 
second week the truth began to tell and some special interest 
broke out in one of the Wesleyan churches. 




IRA D. SANKEY, 

THE FAMOUS GOSPEL SINGER. 



88 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

It was interesting to note the reason why Mr. Moody grew in 
favor with the people from day to day. It was all on account of 
his Bible talks and expositions of the Scriptures. It was seen at 
once that he was a man mighty in the Word ; this won the sym- 
pathies of Christians and brought them over to his side. These 
talks were very plain and direct, dealt with the simple funda- 
mental truths of the Gospel, and were sent home, as an athlete 
would say, "right from the shoulder." 

It was an unusual sight to see the people going to the churches 
on a week day with their Bibles in their hands, ready to follow 
the reading. It is stated as a fact that very soon there sprang up 
such a demand for Bibles with index and concordance, that the 
publishers were compelled to print much larger editions, and even 
then were unable to supply the demand as the Evangelists passed 
from one place to another. Whatever else can be said, there was 
certainly a revival of interest in the Bible. 

NOVEL FEATURES OF THE WORK. 

Mr. Moody also introduced inquiry meetings, in which Chris- 
tian people were expected to get in close contact with individuals 
who were ready for religious instruction, and were willing to be 
led in the right way. These were something new, and anything 
that is new must fight its wa} r to public recognition, however good 
it may be. If the angel Gabriel were to come down from heaven, 
there are plenty of people who would ask for his credentials. The 
proof of these inquiry meetings was in the results, and nothing could 
be said against them, except by those who were opposed to Chris- 
tian work of every sort. 

• Mr. Moody closed his work in York with an all-day meeting in 
which for every hour he assigned some special topic and had a 
leader appointed to take charge. The very novelty of this meet- 
ing attracted attention, and was approved by Christians generally, 
although it must be said that the chief obstacle in the way of the 
work in York was the critical coldness and indifference of the min- 
isters, many of whom looked upon the Evangelists as interlopers 
who were running before they were sent. Yet the all-day meeting 



MOODY AND SAN KEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 89 

was a fitting close to the work that had been carried on. There 
was an hour for confession; another for praise ; another for experi- 
ences ; another for testimony ; another for young converts to wit- 
ness for Christ ; and, last of all, an hour for communion, which 
was conducted by several ministers, with an address among others 
by Mr. Moody. 

North ,.of the city of York, on the coast of Durham, is the 
large town of Sunderland. This place was reported to be as dull 
and unpromising for evangelistic work as York itself was. But 
there was one good Baptist brother in this place who had been to 
York and attended some of the meetings, with the result that he 
caught fire and was all aglow. He made up his mind that on his 
own responsibility he would invite Moody and Sankey to hold 
services in his church. He was a zealous minister, and was ready 
to adopt any measures that would stir the people and push on the 
good work. 

"NOT MAD, MOST NOBLE FESTUS." 

And here it may be said that one main reason why Mr. Moody 
did not enlist at once the sympathies and co-operation of the min- 
isters and other influential persons was the fact that his methods 
were somewhat new, seemed to many to be ultra and extreme, and 
they, therefore, hesitated about giving him their support. His 
only reply was that extreme worldliness and indifference required 
extreme treatment. After all, it is not strange that ministers and 
others wished to look and examine before they began to adopt and 
praise. Mr. Moody stuck to his own measures, for he had proved 
them too long to doubt their efficiency, and he was not ready to 
give them up because some timid conservative brethren shook 
their heads and said, "It was never so seen in Israel." 

The Rev. Arthur Rees was the man who invited Mr. Moody 
to Sunderland ; his heart was in the work. In speaking of the 
situation, one gentleman said, " Mr. Moody had one whole min- 
ister, three-fourths of one other, and nothing, or next to nothing, 
of all the rest, who helped in his meetings." 

Mr. Rees was a broad-minded liberal Christian, and although 



90 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

a Baptist, while Moody and Sankey were not, this made no differ- 
ence in the warm welcome he gave to these men and the hearti- 
ness with which he supported their labors. But the field was very 
tough, and for a time it seemed as if the ground would never be 
broken up. The congregations were large, drawn out of curiosity, 
just as people would have flocked if a circus had come to town ; the 
preaching was acceptable and the singing of Sankey was wonder- 
ful, but for all this the work dragged and results were very meagre. 
Finally Moody said, " We can never go on in this way. It is easier 
to fight the devil than fighting the ministers." 

One day there came a delegation from the Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association to ask Mr. Moody to give them an address in Vic- 
toria Hall on Sunday afternoon. u O, yes," said Moody, "I'll 
preach for you." " We don't want you to preach for us ; we want 
you to preach for Christ." " All right," said Moody, "I'll be there 
to preach for you." 

WERE AFRAID TO TAKE THE RISK. 

Then the committee went on to explain that the reason why 
the association had not gone in with Moody and Sankey heart and 
soul was not because of any want of sympathy, but because he had 
come to them in a sectarian connection. The association felt that 
they could not take the risk of identifying themselves with any 
particular sect. Mr. Moody saw the force of the objection and 
explained to the delegation that there was no significance what- 
ever in his holding meetings in a church of one denomination, for 
he was j ust as willing to go to any other church. But in order to 
remove all this apprehension he conducted his services afterward 
in Victoria Hall, saying that he was always anxious to go where 
he could do the most good. 

It is amusing to read of the impression that was made upon the 
young men who visited him. They were a good deal disappointed 
by the rough appearance of the evangelists and their off-hand 
manner. One said he thought it was a money making scheme 
out and out. This shows how easy it is to get mistaken impres- 
sions. It was only natural that suspicion should be awakened, 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 91 

for these men were quite unknown and their reputation had not 
yet been made. 

A very pleasant incident that contributed largely to aid the 
work in Sunderland was the emphatic endorsement of Mr. Moody 
by the famous Wesleyan preacher, Rev. William Morley Punshon. 
Mr. Punshon' s name was known throughout the world as a most 
eloquent preacher and a warm friend of all true evangelical work. 
It seems that some of the Wesleyan ministers of Sunderland 
thought they sniffed Calvinistic theology, not so much in Mr. 
Moody's discourses, but in some of his exhortations to inquirers, 
and they were in doubt about giving him the right hand of fellow- 
ship. Mr. Punshon was at this time President of the Wesleyan 
Conference and happened to come to Sunderland to attend a 
special service. 

ENDORSED BY HIGH AUTHORITY. 

Fortunately he had known Mr. Moody in Chicago and had no 
reason to doubt the genuiness of the man or his work. He knew 
Mr. Moody had done wonders in Chicago, that his spirit was broad 
and catholic, that he was thoroughly in earnest and, if properly 
supported, his coming to Sunderland would prove an event in the 
religious history of that city. Mr. Pnnshon wisely advised all 
the ministers to co-operate with Mr. Moody. Still several min- 
isters opposed the movement, wrote pamphlets against it and 
tried to defeat it. 

Such urgent appeals, such indiscriminate offers of the water 
of life to everybody willing to receive it, such an utter absence of 
all ecclesiastical forms and fussing, could not be tolerated by 
some men of the cloth. However, suffice it to say, the opposition 
was lived down and the city of Sunderland was taken by storm. 
Some disliked Mr. Sankey's solos, but many were impressed by 
them and he kept right on singing. Some thought too much 
pressure was used to bring people to an immediate decision ; all 
Mr. Moody could say in reply was, "now is the accepted time," 
and for this he had the warrant of the Bible itself. What could 
all the little petty criticisms and narrow minded objections avail 
against the words of Scripture ? 



92 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

The next place visited by Moody and Sankey was Newcastle. 
This town is in the midst of the coal regions of the north, and has 
a large population of plain, working people. The fact that a large 
business in coal is carried on accounts for the saying about " car- 
rying coals to Newcastle." The idea is that it is quite superfluous 
to do some things. But it was not superfluous to bring these evan- 
gelists to Newcastle, for there they had one of their grandest 
triumphs, and it was in this town that the floodgates were opened 
and a mighty influence went forth that affected the whole British 
kingdom. 

The services were not only announced in the churches and 
newspapers, but large placards were posted stating that at such a 
time and in such a place Mr. Moody would preach the Gospel and 
Mr. Sankey would sing the Gospel. The manner of announce- 
ment was enough to arouse public attention, and the largest places 
in town were crowded with eager listeners from the first. The 
worthy pastor of the Presbyterian Church, who had met Mr. 
Moody on one of his former visits to England, was somewhat 
shocked at this announcement. But he attended the first meeting. 
Being a little late, he found Mr. Moody sending a large number 
of inquirers into the separate room for religious conversation. 
" Here, Brother Lowe," exclaimed Moody, "go in and talk to all 
these inquirers. You'll find so many of them that you'll have to 
make them into a class." 

CHURCHES THROWN WIDE OPEN. 

During the first week of the services five separate churches 
were placed at Mr. Moody's disposal, and services were held in all 
of them, but he finally conducted his meetings in one church, and 
that the largest in the city. The eagerness to attend these ser- 
vices was so great, and the crowds were so enormous that one 
brother actually declared he was glad when Moody went away. 
The people who could not gain admittance were so disappointed 
as to often become disorderly. Mr. Moody declared that he would 
stay in Newcastle until he had conquered the prejudices of minis- 
ters, and had made the people acquainted with his true motives. 



MOODY AND SANKEV IN GKKAT BRITAIN. 93 

Very soon the most of the ministers in Newcastle were heart 
and soul with him. Surrounding towns and villages felt the 
overflow of the great wave of religious power, and shared in the 
blessing. Hundreds of meetings were held in outside places, and 
the community far and near was thoroughly awakened. One all- 
day meeting had been held at York ; two were held at Newcastle. 
These meetings were so novel as to call out large crowds of people. 
One of them was a most remarkable praise service, conducted by 
Mr. Sankey. By this time all the north of England and Scotland 
had heard what \\ as going on at Newcastle. The newspapers were 
full of it, and many ministers and others, who had come from dis- 
tant places to see the wonders of grace returned to tell the story, 
and in this way new interest was created in many localities. 

GRAND INVASION OF SCOTLAND. 

We next find Moody and Sankey in Scotland. One might 
ask at the outset, what will such, men do in such a place as Scotland? 
Scotchmen are hard-headed, disposed to argue, fond of dogmas, 
and have a profound reverence for the doctrines and traditions of 
the past. It has been said that if you take a hair that is so fine 
nobody else can split it, a Scotchman will split it, and then split 
the pieces. If the Evangelists can move Scotland they will 
have to be pronounced extraordinary men ; we know that they 
did move Scotland, and it could not have been by mere human 
power. 

It must be said one thing was in favor of Mr. Moody, and 
that was his intimate knowledge of the Bible. The Scotch are 
great Bible students; it is customary in all the churches for 
the people to open their Bibles and follow the minister while 
he reads, and half of Scotch preaching consists in expounding 
the Scriptures. The ministers there go on doing it year after 
year. 

Mr. Moody came without any " Rev." to his name, without 
any college education, without any diploma from a theological 
school, without anything whatever to recommend him, except 
his zeal as an Evangelist, and the fact which was now greatly in 



94 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

his favor that lie had been meeting with success. But what m 
the world was to be done with Sankey ? Sankey was singing Gos- 
pel hymns, and the Scotch had always sung the Psalms of David, 
in one version or another. The introduction of hymns into Scot- 
tish worship was fought, tooth and nail, as if they were produc- 
tions of the devil and would overthrow all evangelical religion. 
Yet here was a man singing hymns, and with a small organ 
to help him, or as the Scotch in derision called it, a " a kist fu' 
o' whistles." 

Still, it must be said that a vast number of people in Scotland 
were thoroughly disgusted with theological controversies and 
hair-splitting, saw nothing in cold arguments to edify a soul 
thirsting for the water of life, and were ready to rise in rebellion 
against stereotyped doctrines and forms, and begin an evangelical 
revolution. Years before, when Richard Weaver, a converted col- 
lier, an extraordinary man, without education, but with great 
natural force and ability, went through Scotland preaching his 
simple sermons and singing his very commonplace hymns, thou- 
sands followed him wherever his services were held. Mr. Moody 
had this in his favor, that his work had been blessed in other 
places, especially in Newcastle. 

POWERFUL SUPPORT FROM MINISTERS. 

Thus there were ministers of great influence who were ready 
to welcome the Evangelists. Among these was Rev. John Kei- 
man, of the Free Church in Leith, a suburb of Edinburgh, who 
had been to Newcastle, and with his own eyes and ears had seen 
and heard wonderful things. He could not rest until he had stirred 
up his brethren to avail themselves of the grand opportunity they 
had of having special work carried on by these men from America. 
With him was Rev. J. H. Wilson of Edinburgh, a host in himself, 
and Mr. Moody having been invited by these two men, consid- 
ered he had call enough to warrant his going to the "modern 
Athens " in the strength and faith of the simple Gospel. 

Immediately there was a strong anticipation of a great awak- 
ening, and a daily prayer meeting was appointed to make prepar- 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 95 

ations for what was coming. The first service was held in the 
Music Hall, November 23rd, where a dense crowd assembled to 
hear the preaching and singing. Mr. Moody was sick and unable 
to be present, and Rev. Mr. Wilson was compelled to take 
his place. The next evening Mr. Sankey's instrument had 
gone wrong, and he was compelled to drop out of the meeting. 
But Edinburgh was stirred through all its borders, and from the 
outset vast congregations flocked to the churches and public halls, 
and the revival was the only thing apparently that occupied the 
minds of the people. Meetings would be going on in half a dozen 
different places at the same time, all of them thronged to the doors 
and great numbers unable to obtain admission. 

SCOTLAND ON FIRE. 

Very rapidly the interest spread from one place to another, 
until it seemed as if all Scotland was ablaze. Everybody was talk- 
ing about Moody and Sankey, and while there were some who were 
disposed to be critical and ridicule bad grammar and lack of edu- 
cation, the great mass of common people knew their man by a 
kind of instinct, and took him for the time being as their prophet. 
All through the country the newspapers began to give notices of 
the meetings, and the work of Moody and Sankey in Scotland was 
nothing less than a great public event. Parents attended the 
services with their children, and masters and mistresses sent their 
servants in the hope of their receiving spiritual benefit. 

Dr. Horatius Bonar expressed the belief "that there was 
scarcely a Christian household in all Edinburgh in which there 
were not one or more persons converted during this revival." 
Ministers were very solicitous lest those who visited the inquiry 
room to receive instruction should be led astray by persons who 
were not fully qualified to converse with them and point out the 
way of life. To remedy this, tickets were issued by a committee 
appointed for the purpose, to such persons as they considered 
competent for this work after they had conversed with them and 
learned their qualifications. This proved to be a good system and 
worked admirably. A large number of religious workers, many 



$6 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

of whom possessed great tact and discretion, came forward and 
offered their services, and it is safe to say that without them the 
grand results would not have been realized and the movement 
would not have been such a complete success. 

Of course, Mr. Moody's vast work could not go on without 
arousing opposition. At such a time the devil is always ver} r 
jealous of doctrines, and greatly alarmed lest there shall be false 
teaching. It began to be whispered around that Mr. Moody was 
not quite orthodox, that he held some strange notions, that people 
must be on their guard lest the truth should be perverted, and 
even his personal character was attacked in the hope of defeating 
his usefulness. Somebody received, or claimed to have received, a 
letter from America stating that many of the brethren did not 
favor Mr. Moody and his methods. He resolved to strangle this 
lie before it got its boots on and made ready for a run. 

OPPOSITION COMPLETELY SQUELCHED. 

No man in all America could command such strong endorse- 
ments as he could, and he resolved to obtain them without delay. 
The most influential ministers and laymen of Chicago sent a 
strong letter of endorsement which completely squelched the 
petty lies and insinuations that the contemptible minions of vice 
and wickedness were scattering broadcast in the hope of injuring 
the grandest leader in the Christian world. They crawled into 
their miserable holes — these scapegraces did — and were not seen 
or heard of afterward. 

In spite of everything, however, things would sometimes 
occur in the meetings that were to be regretted. When a great 
flood sweeps down the valley there is sure to be a lot of driftwood 
with it, or, rather, it would be more appropriate to say, that when 
the good seed of the kingdom is being sown the enemy is sure to 
come at night and sow tares along with it. But the hearty 
manner in which the ministers who had faith in Mr. Moody — and 
nearly all of them soon came to have it — stood up for him, relieved 
the situation and the work went on triumphantly. Dr. Bonar had 
his soul stirred with righteous indignation, and put out a pamph- 



Moody and sankey in great Britain. 97 

let embodying a noble defense of Moody and Sankey. Half of 
Scotland were satisfied with any endorsement from this man, for 
the\- had perfect faith in his sincerity and wisdom ; we had almost 
said that a more lovely, angelic man never lived. 

Large numbers of persons from different parts of Scotland 
visited Edinburgh during the meeting, drawn by extraordinary 
accounts of the things that were taking place. The battle had 
been fought and the victory won. The old town of Edinburgh 
had been captured, and along with it pretty much the whole of 
Scotland. People sent applications from distant places for workers 
to come and help them, and the men who had been baptized with 
faith and enthusiasm went out to carry the gracious influence of 
this evangelistic work. 

A MULTITUDE OF CONVERTS. 

Converts were numbered by thousands. The most difficult 
question was as to what should be done with them, how the lost 
sheep gathered back should be brought into the fold, what Chris- 
tian homes should be provided for them, and how they should be 
strengthened for their new life. Anyone can see at a glance 
what a demand was made upon ministers for thorough revival 
work, and that only men of this spirit would be likely to gather 
the fruits of Mr. Moody's labors. 

One of the most powerful influences working against Moody 
and Sankey working in Edinburgh was a celebrated infidel club. 
A number of men carried on an organized opposition to Christian- 
ity, and were naturally very much disturbed when the whole town 
was running wild after religion. One evening the chairman of 
this club came to Mr. Mood3''s meeting, and afterward went into 
the inquiry room for conversation. When Mr. Moody spoke to 
him, he bristled up and was very anxious to enter into an argu- 
ment. Mr. Moody thwarted him in this purpose, knowing very 
well that an argument would settle nothing. He asked the man 
if he wished to be a Christian. He said he did not, and that he 
had a very poor opinion of Christians. 

"Would you like me to pray with you?" asked Mr. Moody. 

7 



98 MOODY AND SANKET IN UKEAT BRITAIN. 

" Well," said the other, " you can try your hand on me if you 
like, but I think you will find me a match for you." 

Mr. Moody knelt down by his side and prayed for him. A 
notable fact is that this very man was brought in afterwards, and 
along with him seventeen other members of this infidel club. One 
of this number afterward became an evangelist, and tried his best 
to undo the evil he and his fellows had done. 

Suffice it to say, that a very deep and genuine work resulted 
from the labors of the evangelists in the Scottish capital. Of 
course there was now an open door for them in all directions, and 
if they could have multiplied themselves a hundred fold they 
would have had enough, and more than enough, to do. 

VAST THRONGS IN GLASGOW. 

Mr. Moody was in Glasgow in 1872, but no special interest 
was created at that time. Before he and Mr. Sankey went there 
from Edinburgh, prayer meetings had been held for a month to 
prepare a way for their coming. They began their services on 
the 8th of February, 1874. • Great crowds of people poured out 
and filled several of the largest churches. At a previous meeting 
of the ministers, called for the purpose of making arrangements, 
it was noted with great satisfaction that ministers of all the 
branches of the Presbyterian Church, including the Establish- 
ment, together with others not of the Presbyterian faith and order, 
were seated on the same platform, exhibiting a very happy spirit 
of harmony. 

Thus Mr. Moody was able to unite Christians of every name 
and bring them together in one vast working phalanx. When the 
.evangelists arrived in Glasgow they found everything in readi- 
ness, and predicted from the outset that a great blessing would 
follow. All sorts of meetings for all classes of people were held- 
and a systematic effort was made to reach everybody in the city. 
People came in from surrounding places and went back to tell 
what the Lord was doing. In one instance five young men attended 
some of the meetings and then went to their distant homes, where 
special interest was created at once by what they had to relate. 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 99 

One remarkable feature of the Glasgow services was the great 
number of requests for prayer. Requests would come in on behalf 
of people away at the ends of earth — in Canada, in the United 
States, in Australia and in far away New Zealand. A letter was 
received from a young man in New Zealand stating that prayer 
had been answered for him, and he had ridden a hundred and fifty 
miles to post a letter to his parents seeking reconciliation with them 
after an unfortunate disagreement. 

BRAWNY MEN WITH DINNER-PAILS. 

Open-air meetings were held in various places, and men in 
their working clothes with their dinner pails in their hands would 
stop and listen eagerly. In carrying on these services the Young 
Men's Christian Association took an active part. Nor were the 
children neglected ; special services were held for them, and these 
were attended by multitudes. Mr. Moody found great favor with 
the general public. In one of the large ship yards an invitation 
was signed by 500 workmen requesting him to address them dur- 
ing the noon hour. Out of this grew a prayer meeting in that 
place which was attended by many of the 2,000 workmen. Mem- 
bers of the regular choir that had been organized for the services 
went every day and sang to them. 

Thus the work went on very much as it had done in other 
places — the same preparation, the same unity among Christians, 
the same great crowds moved by a common impulse, the same 
earnest preaching, the same thrilling hymns sung by Mr. Sankey 
the same inquiry meetings and similar results. Bands of young 
men and young women went out into the alleys and by-ways, 
gathering in the great number of those who had lived all their 
lives under the shadow of churches yet had seldom, if ever, stepped 
inside. The work pervaded all classes and there was but one 
opinion concerning it. No one doubted that it was genuine, was 
carried on with proper motives and was producing a lasting effect 
upon the religious life of the city, ' and, in fact, upon Scotland 
generally. 

On the 1 6th of April there was a remarkable Christian Con- 



100 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

vention held at the Kibble Crystal Palace, a place that would seat 
6,000 persons. This convention was composed largely of Chris- 
tian workers, and was attended by the most eminent ministers, 
not only in Glasgow, but from other places. During Mr. Moody's 
last week the services were held in the same place, and night after 
night the spacious edifice was crowded and many were unable to 
gain admittance. On one evening there was a meeting for shop- 
girls who were unable to get to an early service. This meeting 
was held very late, and it was estimated that 9,000 of this class 
were in the building and outside. The next evening it was esti- 
mated that 7,000 young men attended the service. 

THRILLING GOSPEL SONGS. 

Over all these vast assemblies Mr. Sankey' s clear, ringing 
voice, full of pathos, tenderness and power, was heard, holding the 
multitudes breathless with his Gospel songs. It is impossible to 
give an adequate idea of this most remarkable religious work in 
the west of Scotland. It was about this time that Mr. Sankey 
found in the corner of a newspaper that hymn which has since 
become famous, entitled "The Ninety and Nine." 

It was a fugitive piece, floating around and apparently 
unnoticed, but Mr, Sankey saw at once what a power it possessed 
if set to proper music. He hastily wrote out a tune, but without 
any thought that it would last longer than for temporary use, his 
intention being to have Mr. P. P. Bliss, or some other music com- 
poser, write a tune that would be as, he thought, more appropriate. 
But "The Ninety and Nine" as Mr. Sankey sang it has lived, 
and will doubtless live to the end of time. 

The following are the words of probably the most famous 
hymn that Mr. Sankey ever sang : 

THE NINETY AND NINE. 
There were ninety and nine that safely lay 

In the shelter of the fold, 
But one was out on the hills away, 

Far from the gates of gold. 
Away on the mountains wild and bare, 
Away from the tender Shepherds care. 




BETSEY MOODY 

MOTHER OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST 




WANAMAKER FALLS-NORTH Fl ELD 




1. NORTH FARM-HOUSE WHERE MOODY BEGAN HIS SEMINARY 

2. STONE HALL-CONTAINING CHAPEL AND RECITATION ROOMS 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 101 

" Lord, Thou hast here Thy ninety and nine; 

Are they not enough for Thee ?" 
But the Shepherd made answer: "This of Mine 

Has wandered away from Me; 
And although the road be rough and steep 
I go to the desert to find My sheep." 

But none of the ransomed ever knew 

How deep were the waters crossed; 
Nor how dark was the night that the Lord passed through 

Ere He found His sheep that was lost. 
Out in the desert He heard it's cry — 
Sick, and helpless, and ready to die. 

" Lord, whence are those blood drops all the way 

That mark out the mountains track ? " 
"They were shed for one who had gone astray 

Ere the Shepherd could bring him back." 
"Lord, whence are thy hands so rent and torn ?" 
"They are pierced tonight by many a thorn." 

And all thro* the mountains, thunder-riven, 

And up from the rocky steep, 
There rose a cry to the gate of heaven, 

"Rejoice! I have found My sheep!" 
And the angels echoed around the throne, 
''Rejoice, for the Lord brings back His own! " 

Henceforth a triumphal progress attended Moody and San- 
key, and the success of their labors was assured beforehand. 
While they were in Scotland many invitations from Ireland came, 
and so after leaving Glasgow they began services in Belfast. Their 
first meeting was held on the 6th of September in one of the large 
churches at 8 o'clock in the morning. Even at that early hour 
the place was crammed long before the time for the service, and 
many were turned away from the doors. The second meeting at 
ii o'clock was held in a larger place, and a still larger place had 
to be secured for the evening. Here, as elsewhere, a daily prayer 
meeting was established and became an important adjunct to the 
work. Some one in speaking of it said it was the center of the 
whole movement. 

As showing the great eagerness of people to hear the Evan- 
gelists, a meeting was held one evening for those who had not been 



102 MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

able hitherto to gain admittance. Tickets were issued for this 
service, and applications were received for more than three thou- 
sand. On one occasion as many as six hundred men responded 
to an invitation to enter the inquiry room. 

One of the features of the work in Belfast was an immense 
outdoor meeting held in the early part of October. So great was 
the interest felt and the desire to attend, that the railway com- 
panies reduced the fare and ran special trains. The committee of 
arrangements had resolved to bring together a hundred thousand 
people, their motto being, "All Ireland for Christ." 

RECEIVED EVERYWHERE WITH DELIGHT. 

From Belfast the Evangelists went to a number of other 
places, and to give accounts of their services would be simply a 
repetition of what has already been narrated. They were received 
with great favor everywhere; opposition had been lived down; 
ministers and churches were united in the work; Mr. Sankey's 
singing produced the same marvellous effects, and Mr. Moody's 
preaching went home to the hearts of the people. After returning 
to Belfast to hold a farewell service, an attack was made upon the 
citadels of sin in Dublin. Here extraordinary scenes were wit- 
nessed, and the city was shaken to its center. 

Mr. Moody had labored under such disadvantages by holding 
his meetings in buildings that were not large enough for them, 
that when he went to Dublin he made it a condition that his ser- 
vices should be held in the Exhibition Palace, a magnificent 
structure that was built for a place of amusement. Even this 
large building was filled day after day and the work went on with 
amazing power. Sometimes as many as seven hundred inquirers 
would be found after the services, showing with what power and 
effect the truth had been proclaimed. 

One meeting worth mentioning was held among the soldiers 
of the garrison near by. Mr. Moody was quite at home with 
these soldiers on account of the experience he had in the work 
of the Christian Commission during our Civil War. In his 
most telling manner he related many incidents, told stories to the 



MOODY AND SANKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 103 

men by which they were greatly affected and made to weep like 
children, and completely gained their confidence by the warm 
interest he took in their welfare. 

Mr. Moody having finished his labors in Ireland returned to 
England where, in many places, his coming was awaited with 
-ager expectation. He held services in nearly all the large cities, 
_uch as Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham and Liverpool. One 
after another these places were turned upside down ; they were 
shaken by the mighty power of the truth preached and sung by 
these strange men of faith from a far land. 

IMMENSE MEETINGS IN LARGE CITIES. 

In Liverpool especially, where Mr. Moody had become well 
known on one of his former visits to England, he received a 
hearty welcome and the Christian people seemed to be unable to 
do enough to make the undertaking a complete success. They 
were all enlisted in hearty support of the efforts made to evangel- 
ize the masses. Here, as in Scotland and Ireland, multitudes of 
people poured out to attend the services and immense meetings 
were held. The same may be said of the other large towns through 
which the evangelists went. 

It is stated that in Birmingham larger audiences were gath- 
ered than ever had assembled before in that city to hear the Gos- 
pel preached, and it seems that Moody and Sankey were particu- 
larly happy in this town, where their services had been held in 
Bingley Hall. "I must say," said Mr. Moody, " I have never 
enjoyed preaching the Gospel more than since I came to Birming- 
ham. We have reached so many people. I think, if we could, 
we would take up Bingley Hall and carry it round the world 
with us." 

But it was reserved for London to rise up in enthusiasm and 
give the evangelists such a reception as they never had before. 
London is the largest city in the world. When it moves it moves 
like the ocean. Mr. Moody began his work on the 9th of March, 
1875. Elaborate arrangements had been made for the services, 
including a preliminary meeting of ministers of all denominations 



104 MOODY AND SAXKEY IN GREAT BRITAIN. 

numbering several hundred. The}' questioned Mr. Moody very 
closely, and this was what he desired. He wished to remove every 
doubt and prejudice and prepare the way for a grand union move- 
ment that should include the clergy of the established church and 
all others. Finally one good brother wished to know what was Mr. 
Moody's creed. He replied that it had been written for a long time. 
The learned brethren got out their pencils and paper prepared to 
take notes. 

"Please state it," said one of the company, looking gravely 
over his spectacles. Mr. Moody's instant reply was, "You will 
find it written in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah" — a reply that was 
received with hearty applause. 

In different parts of London work was carried on for several 
months. At Islington, in the northern part of the city, is a great 
hall belonging to the Agricultural Society and used for their 
annual exhibitions. This place, among others, was opened to the 
tens of thousands who were anxious to attend the meetings, and 
not long after Mr. Moody's death Mr. Sankey on one occasion 
stated that he thought the largest number of persons the}' had ever 
gathered under one roof was in this hall, and that 17,000 were 
present. 

It would be useless to attempt to reduce to figures the result 
of Mr. Moody's work in great Britain and Ireland. In each of the 
large towns, several thousand persons professed conversion, and 
connected themselves with the different churches. The fame of 
the evangelists by this time had filled the world. England, Scot- 
land, Ireland, and Wales had endorsed the work, which it was not 
difficult to do, since it stood upon its own foundation, and its gen- 
uineness and power could not be denied. Mr. Moody's dream of 
winning ten thousand souls to Christ in England, which was 
thought by many to be only a dream, had been more than realized, 
and to say that ten times that number had been led into a new life, 
would probably come nearer a true statement of the case, 



CHAPTER VI. 
Moody's Great Work in America. 

PON the return of Moody and Sankey to this country they 
found themselves in great demand. The question was not 
whether an open door would be set before them, but where 
they should begin their labors for the evangelization of America. 

Mr. Moody's first duty, as well as pleasure, was to visit his 
old home at Northfield. Love and devotion to his mother formed 
one of the most impressive features in his character. To the early 
training received in his poor mountain home the great Evangelist 
attributed those elements of personal character which crowned with 
success his efforts in spreading the Gospel and in advancing the 
cause of education. 

It fell to the lot of this noble woman to be rewarded for her 
struggle with poverty and debt as few mothers have been blessed. 
She lived to see her son universally honored. The obscure New 
England village of Northfield became noted as his birthplace and 
her home. Massive seminary halls overshadowed the homestead. 
Across the Connecticut Valley, on the side of Mount Hermon, col- 
lege buildings were erected. To the hundreds of students she was 
known and loved as " Grandma" Moody. Each summer scholars 
and students from all parts of the world made pilgrimages to that 
shrine of worship and instruction. 

Habitually when returning to Northfield from his ministry, Mr. 
Moody would drive direct to the home of his mother to receive her 
welcome before joining his immediate family. For more than fifty 
years he sought counsel and approval at her knee. Betsey Moody 
was spared to her son until the closing days of her ninety-first year. 
When she began to fail Mr. Moody was holding meetings in a dis- 
tant city. It was not known that her end was near and he was not 
notified. Toward the close of the week the Evangelist became 
restless and an uncontrollable desire to go home possessed him. 

105 



106 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

For no other reason he canceled his engagement and started for 
Northfield, arriving at his mother's bedside in time to receive her 
last blessing. 

Mr. Moody spent the fall of 1S75 at Northfield, where he re- 
ceived visits from many eminent ministers and Christian workers. 
During this time he held some meetings in his native town, and 
had the pleasure of seeing one of his brothers, Mr. Samuel Moody, 
received into church fellowship. He afterward became President 
of the Northfield Young Men's Christian Association, and was a 
useful man in the community. 

Meanwhile urgent invitations for evangelistic work had come 
to Mr. Moody from New York, Brookhm and Philadelphia. He 
received a friendly visit from Rev. Dr. Cuyler, of Brooklyn, widely 
known as an eloquent preacher and zealous worker, who evidently 
went to Northfield to secure Mr. Moody, if possible, for work in 
the "City of Churches." Dr. Cuyler thus describes his visit: 

THE EVANGELIST AT HOME. 

"Mr. Moody took me all about through that beautiful mountain 
county, stopping every little while to speak to some neighbor, and 
remind him of the meeting that evening at the Congregational 
Church in the village, or to say a few words of encouragement to 
some young convert whom we happened to meet, or introducing his 
guest, and saying: l This is my good friend, Dr. Cuyler. He is 
going to preach to-night ; come and hear him ; ' and so on through 
a whole morning's ride. He was full of work, and continually 
running over with it, and when I got back to Brooklyn, I said to 
my people, this man Moody has the secret of success in the 
Lord's work. He is at it, hard at it, and always at it. 

"That evening the church was full. Moody looked over the 
congregation, and then said to me: 'Half the people below are 
Unitarians, and half in the gallery are Catholics.' But it was all 
the same to him, so long as the} T felt themselves to be sinners in 
need of the Saviour, or were Christians and loved Him." 

At length it was decided that Moody and Sankey should begin 
their work in the Rink, in Brooklyn, a building capable of holding 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 107 

6000 people. This would have been an immense congregation for 
any other man, but it might have been doubled without causing 
any inconvenience to either of the Evangelists. They were appar- 
ently equal to as many thousands as could be gathered under one 
roof. The services began on the 24th of October, with an immense 
throng in attendance, and thereafter were continued with unabated 
enthusiasm. Brooklyn, with all its famous preachers, had never 
been so thoroughly aroused. 

Of Mr. Moody's preaching, Dr. Cuyler said : 

" Mr. Moody never preached better than he has in Brooklyn. 
His discourses on ' Confession of Sin,' on ' Christ saving the lost 
sheep,' and on ' True repentance,' were models of arousing, search- 
ing, and soul-guiding sermons. The critics discover that he will 
persist in putting 'Isrel' for Israel, and 'they was' for they were, and 
'done it' for did it ; but what matters it that the Queen's English 
gets an occasional wound, while the sword of the Spirit is being 
thrust into the hearts of the King's enemies ? It is all very well 
for Brother Moody to say modestly ' that there are plenty of min- 
isters in Brooklyn who can preach far better than I.' But some 
of us know that there is not a minister among us who can pack so 
much soul-saving truth of God into a concise, portable form, and 
send it home with so much momentum as Dwight L. Moody." 

INCIDENTS OF THE INQUIRY MEETINGS. 

Of the work in the inquiry meetings, held in the Reformed 
Church and in the Simpson Methodist Episcopal Church, many 
incidents were related by Mr. Charles M. Morton, the successful 
missionary at the Plymouth Church, Bethel. This ex-soldier who 
has given an arm for his country, and who seems to have given all 
the rest of himself, soul and body, to Christ, was formerly a kind 
of under-pastor of Mr. Moody's Church in Chicago. He said in 
the "Illustrated Christian Weekly :" 

" Almost from the beginning the inquiry meetings have been 
filled with persons of both sexes and of all ages and conditions." 

' ' An old man and his wife, both gray-headed, came forward 
together to the front seats and prayed for ' eleventh hour' mercy, 



108 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

and went away rejoicing. Grateful tears coursed down the cheeks 
of each of them." 

" A young man in the employ of a Brooklyn tailor, on his way 
to a customer with a suit of clothing just finished, stopped in at 
the Rink for a little while, and went on rejoicing in Christ. He 
will attend to his employer's business more promptly in the 
future." 

" On one side of a Christian worker knelt an old, gray-headed 
man, and on the other a tender girl of seventeen. As the tears 
coursed down their cheeks, the father and daughter began the Chris- 
tian life together." 

A SKEPTIC RISES FOR PRAYER. 

" A confirmed skeptic came to the Rink to gratify the curiosity 
he had to ' hear Moody and Sankey,' but could not get in on ac- 
count of the throng. Wandering over to the Reformed Church, he 
met a Christian acquaintance who persuaded him to remain, and they 
had a long conversation. The next night he came to the same meet- 
ing, and was among the first to rise to be prayed for. Walking home 
from the meeting he said ; ' Well, I didn't think the time would 
ever come when I should prefer a prayer-meeting to a theatre.' 
That day he had bought himself a little pocket Testament, and 
when his friend marked a special verse or two for him, he expressed 
the warmest gratitude. A praying mother, whose faithfulness has 
never waned, had much to do with all this." 

"It is amazing," says one who had been with him, " how Mr. 
Moody can do so much and live. He attends and conducts a morn- 
ing prayer-meeting at the Tabernacle ; a second meeting at 4 p. m., 
for Christian instruction ; preaches at 7.30 at the Rink ; goes at a 
little before 8.30 to an inquiry meeting in the church opposite ; 
rides thence down to the Tabernacle, and preaches to a congrega- 
tion of clerks and salesmen and mechanics, a young men's meeting 
at 9 P. M. Then I suppose he goes to bed. Every meeting is well 
attended ; generally crowded. 

"Last week he gave notice that this week admission to the Rink 
would be by ticket. The tickets would be given only to non-church 




REV. GEORGE F. PENTECOST, D. D. 

ONE OF MR. MOODY'S MOST TRUSTED AND SUCCESSFUL HELPERS 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK i\ AMERICA. loo 

members. l We have entertained yon church people long enough/ 
said he ; ' we propose to dismiss this audience and to speak to 
another congregation.' It seemed like a hazardous experiment. 
Would seven or eight thousand people, not church members, go 
after tickets to hear the Gospel, obtainable only on the ground that 
they were non-church members ? The actual result was a greater 
crowd than ever. The committee say that if they had possessed 
twenty thousand more tickets they could have disposed of them all." 
Mr. Sankey's gift of song had much to do with the success of 
the meetings, and through the efforts of the hymn and tune 
writers who produced so many popular songs which he introduced 
to the public, there arose a new species of religious psalmody — 
the "Gospel hymns," commonly known then as " Moody and 
Sankey tunes." It is an interesting sidelight on the character of 
Mr. Moody that the immense profits derived in later years from the 
copyright royalties on these hymns were wholly used for religious 
purposes and the establishing of Christian institutions, no penny, 
it is said, ever going into the Evangelist's private purse. 

GREAT AWAKENING IN PHILADELPHIA. 

Preparations for a great evangelistic movement had long been 
going on in Philadelphia. Anticipating the multitudes which 
their foreign reputation promised, the old Pennsylvania Railroad 
freight depot, which had been recently abandoned, now the Wana- 
maker store, was secured for the meetings and fitted up to seat 
about 13,000 people, and from November, 1875, to Feb. 1876, it 
was crowded three times a day every day in the week. As many 
as 16,000 tickets were taken up at single meetings. The number 
of conversions at these meetings was very great, as was shown by 
the large number of acquisitions to the membership not only of 
the city churches, directly traceable to depot meetings, but also of 
churches for hundreds of miles around. 

Mr. Moody's great capacity for leadership was then promptly 
recognized. His sincerity was unquestioned. There was not an 
element of gain in it for him or Mr. Sankey. No collections were 
taken up. The royalties on the hymn books issued by them were 



110 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

used in Evangelistic work, principally in Chicago, and distributed 
by a committee, of which the late George H. Stuart was chairman, 
although they amounted up to this time to more than $300,000. 
The one collection made was at the close of the series of meetings 
for the special purpose of paying off the debt resting upon the 
Young Men's Christian Association Building in Philadelphia. A 
prominent philanthropist started it at $25,000, and the entire col- 
lection amounted to $125,000. 

THE IMMENSE TABERNACLE. 

The use of the old freight depot was given by Mr. Wana- 
maker, for many years one of Mr. Moody's warmest friends and 
generous supporters. He was about to establish the largest retail 
store in the world, and stopped his plans for reconstructing the 
building until the Moody services were over. He personally 
superintended the work of fitting it up and getting it ready for the 
meetings. The following description, written at the time, conveys 
a good idea of the great tabernacle : 

"Ten large doors give easy ingress to a broad vestibule run- 
ning on three sides of the building. Inside of this is the new 
audience room. Four main isles running the entire length of the 
hall are crossed by eight others, from all of which there are doors 
of entrance or exit. The platform stretching across the rear of 
the hall is forty-five feet deep. The main floor rises toward the 
end remotest from the platform, to give to those in the rear seats 
a full view of the speaker. Ten thousand two hundred chairs are 
placed in order on the main floor and platform. 

"The exposed beams and rafters of the building are painted 
white, tastefully lined with blue, and ornamented with scarlet. 
About one thousand gas burners give light to the hall. The isles 
are laid with cocoa matting. The building is well heated by 
steam, and the ventilation is thorough. Across the platform end 
of the hall and along the sides are inscribed appropriate texts of 
Scripture. 

" Large rooms are arranged for inquiries at the platform end of 
the hall, also a private room for Mr. Moody, with access under the 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. Ill 

platform to his desk. Ample provision is made for reporters, also 
for the committee of arrangements and its secretary. 

"When lighted and filled this building presents an imposing 
appearance. Nothing like it in extent and commodiousness was 
ever before secured in Philadelphia for a public gathering of any 
character. The preparation of it within the time taken and at the 
expense involved is in itself an evidence of revived interest in the 
Lord's work in this city." 

Mr. George H. Stuart was chairman of the Executive Com- 
mittee, and Bishop New T ton presided over the Ministerial Com- 
mittee, while the strongest, most active and efficient men to be 
obtained made up the rank and file of these organizations. To- 
gether they formed a host. 

The plan for work in the inquiry-rooms was substantially the 
same as that employed in the former great revivals. The workers 
were tried and trusty men and women. They spoke w T ith their 
Bibles in their hands, turning to those passages which seemed best 
to meet the case. In short, it was the Bible method over again. 

WELL TRAINED FOR THE WORK. 

Rev. Dr. Newton, in speaking of the preparation for this 
work, says: "A part of this preparation was to have a class of 
Christian workers trained and ready to go into the inquiry-rooms 
and render service there, in guiding anxious souls to Jesus. This 
class was composed of between three and four hundred Christian 
men and women. These were gathered from the different churches 
in the city known to be in sympathy with the Evangelists and 
their work. They were the best specimens of Christian knowledge 
and experience that these churches could furnish. And when con- 
vened together this body of 'Christian Workers' made up a deeply 
interesting assembly. 

"The preparation of these workers was intrusted to a committee 
of four ministers, representing the leading Protestant denomina- 
tions. The Rev. Dr. Breed represented the Presbyterian Church ; 
the Rev. Dr. J. Wheaton Smith, the Baptist ; the Rev. Dr. Hat- 
field, the Methodist; and the present writer the Episcopal Church. 



112 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

This committee met the workers several times for general counsel 
and directions in view of the solemn and responsible work in which 
they were to engage. At these meetings each member of the min- 
isterial committee addressed the workers in turn. There was no 
concert or agreement beforehand as to the points to be discussed, 
and yet the most delightful harmon}^ prevailed through all the 
exercises. 

"No one jarring or discordant note was struck from the begin- 
ning to the end. If a stranger had been present he might have 
listened most attentively to the teachings of these men, represent- 
ing the leading branches of the Protestant Church ; and for the 
life of him he could not have detected the slightest shade of differ- 
ence in their teaching. From anything he saw or heard there he 
could not have told who was the Presbyterian, the Baptist, the 
Methodist or the Episcopalian. The watchmen on the walls of 
Zion were seeing eye to eye." 

MR. MOODY'S LETTER TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

Wherever the Evangelists had labored they left behind them 
a large number of converts who wished to keep in constant com- 
munication with them in order to receive sympathy and help in 
the new life they were living, the trials and responsibilities of 
which many of them felt themselves too weak to bear. While in 
Brooklyn Mr. Moody wrote a kind of circular, apostolic letter to 
all such. It was published in Philadelphia and sent out on its 
helpful mission to all in every place who had, through him, received 
the words of life. 

This letter assured them that they were not forgotten by 
their great leader, that they were not like lambs left to perish 
without the care of a shepherd, that they had grand moral sup- 
port in their conflicts and were sure of victory. The letter was 
as follows : 

Dear Christian Friends: Since returning to America, in 
response to my invitation, I have received precious communications 
from many of you. Were it possible I would gladly reply to each; 
but, as I have not opportunity for this, I shall avail my self of the 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 113 

columns of " The Christian " to send to you all a few words of 
greeting. 

I praise God continually for what he has done for you in 
saving your souls through the blood of Jesus Christ his Son. You 
are much on my heart, and in my prayers. But most glad am I 
to know, that when I cease to remember, Jesus himself bears each 
one of you in continual remembrance before his Father. You are ' 
graven upon the palms of his hands (Isa. 49: 16), and written upon 
the heart of his affections (Ex. 28: 29); and of you lie has said, 
"My sheep shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them 
out of my hand" (John 10: 28). 

SOURCE OF DAILY COMFORT. 

You have taken the Lord Jesus for your Redeemer, and it Has 
become eternal salvation unto you. Now, Jesus is something more 
to you. He has become your High. Priest. His great business in 
heaven to-day is to represent you — your needs, your infirmities, and 
your trials. I want you to know this very fully; for no other 
truth can give you more daily comfort, or more firmly establish 
you in a constant holy walk. Having died to save you, Jesus lives 
to keep you. At the cross He washed you from the condemnation 
of sin; at' the mercy-seat He will cleanse you from daily defilement. 

Some of you bave written me how old besetting sins are an- 
noying you. Take them straight to Jesus. Don't rely too much 
on yourselves in overcoming them; don't follow Human advice too 
much, or copy the example of other people too much in gaining 
the victory. Spare yourselves this weariness. Cast it all before 
your blessed Advocate, and let Him bear you and your burdens too. 

And do not, above all, forsake your Bibles. You can never 
separa'-e Jesus the Word made flesh from the written Word. He 
who proclaimed Himself the Way, declared also that He was the\ 
Truth. Pack your memory full of passages of Scripture, with 
which to meet Satan when he comes to tempt or accuse you; and 
be not com ent to simply know but strive to obey the Word of God. 
Never think that Jesus has commanded a trifle, nor dare to trifle with 
anything He has commanded. 



114 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

I exhort the young men to be sober. Exercise yourselves unto 
godliness; run the race according to Paul's motto, " Looking off 
unto Jesus ;" draw your inspiration and power directly from Him- 
self. 

I exhort the young women to great moderation. Your sphere 
of testimony may not be public ; your place of usefulness may not 
be large ; in your own homes " adorn the doctrine of God your 
Saviour." Keep one little thought in mind — " I have none but 
Jesus to please." And so make your dress as simple as you know 
will please your Lord ; make your deportment as modest as you 
know will commend itself to Him. 

ABOUNDING LOVE AND KNOWLEDGE. 

And for you all, "among whom we have gone laboring," our 
prayer is, "That your love may abound yet more and more in 
knowledge and in all j udgment ; that ye may approve things that 
are excellent ; that ye may be sincere, and without offence, till the 
day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which 
are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God" (Phil, i : 9, 
10, 11). Mr. Sankey joins me in Christian love. 

Your brother in Christ, D. L. Moody. 

A watch-night meeting was held, which produced a deep im- 
pression on all present. As it drew toward midnight Mr. Moody 
introduced a novel feature, which produced a most telling effect. 
The scene is thus described by the " Sunday School Times :" 

The close of the year was at hand. The Depot Church was 
crowded. Twelve thousand persons sat listening intently to the 
words of the earnest evangelist. Mr. Moody had concluded a ser- 
mon from the text, "How long halt ye between two opinions ? if 
the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him." The 
appeal had came home with power to many who now longed for 
words of personal counsel, or who were burdened with anxious 
doubt. An ordinary inquiry-meeting, such as usually follows Mr. 
Moody's sermons, was not practicable then and there ; for the 
services in the main room were to continue until the new year 
opened. 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 115 

Said Mr. Moody: u Yoti always show an interest in the inquiry- 
meetings. I often see some of yon who are outside looking in at 
the doors to see what is going on in there. Some of yon have been 
in there. Some of yon would like to go there to-night ; but we've 
no chance for such a meeting now. So I propose to turn this whole 
meeting into an inquiry-meeting. Here is the Rev. Dr. Plumer, 
of South Carolina. He is seventy-four years old. He has been 
living on borrowed time for four years. For fifty-five years he has 
been sitting at the feet of Jesus. I'm going to put him on to the 
witness-stand, and question him before you all. Dr. Plumer, will 
you take the pulpit ?" 

A VERY IMPRESSIVE SCENE. 

The venerable clergyman, with his commanding form and 
patriarchal presence, arose, and with tremulous movements took 
the stand before the vast congregation. He gave his Bible greet- 
ing from the seventy-third Psalm to the waiting hearers. Mr. 
Moody plied him with questions in his own peculiar way. In reply 
every word was spoken with distinctness and with deep feeling, as 
if under a sense of weighty responsibility in thus witnessing for 
the Lord. 

It was a most impressive service. Many a soul present seemed 
to feel himself the questioner, and to listen as for his life to the 
answer. In that solemn hour it was as if God's prophecy for the 
latter days was fulfilled: "And I will give power unto my two wit- 
nesses." Their speech and their preaching was not with enticing 
words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of 
power. 

As usual in other places, Mr. Moody held a great Christian 
Convention in Philadelphia, which was attended by over a thousand 
ministers and by a vast Concourse of people. Persons of every 
description, including even Roman Catholics, united in praise of 
the services that had been held and the evident good that had been 
accomplished. When Mr. Moody held his farewell meeting, three 
thousand converts received tickets of admittance. His last dis- 
course was from the word "Able." Among other things he said: 



116 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

"I've long since got over having confidence in myself. My 
only safety is in Christ. Better men and women than any in this 
hall have fallen. David had been God's king twenty years, and yet 
he fell. Keep on watching right on down to the grave. If yon 
are lifted up, and conceited, thinking you're strong enough to fight 
it out yourselves, you'll fall. And now, turn to Isa. 41 : 10: ' I 
will strengthen thee ; yea, I will help thee ; yea, I will uphold thee 
with the right hand of my righteousness.' Be more concerned to 
have God take hold of you, than that you take hold of God. Put 
your hand in God's hand, and say, 'Hold me.' There are two 
lives every Christian must live. The first, a life with God ; the 
second, a life before the world. Keep both of these. See that the 
downward life, which strikes below the surface and roots itself in 
God, is lived right, then the outward life will take care of itself. 

NOT ROOTED AND GROUNDED. 

"We have too many surface Christians. They are like trees 
rooted in a little skin of earth, or top of a rock. A storm of wind 
comes and over they go. Have a deep-rooted, inner life, not a 
superficial one. I've j ust been down in Florida. They've had a very 
dry time there, no rain of any account for months. But the orange- 
trees, looked so vigorous, that I inquired how it was. 'Why,' said 
a man, ' orange-trees have a tap-root that goes clear down to water.' 
So do you strike down. Be rooted and grounded. If you live in 
this way there'll be no trouble about your standing. 

"Now turn for amoment to 2 Timotlry 1 : 12: 'For I know 
whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to keep 
that which I have committed unto him against that day.' What 
had Paul committed to him ? Why, his soul, of course. That he 
is able to keep. Somebody asked a man to what persuasion he 
belonged? He answered, 'To the same persuasion as Paul!' 'And 
what was that, pray?' said the inquirer, 'To the persuasion that 
is able,' and that is the very best persuasion. If you had to keep 
your own souls Satan would get them before you reach home. 

" People say, ' Well, a great many of these young converts will 
fall away.' That's true. The parable of the sower will hold good, 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 117 

I suppose, as long as the world stands. A man came into Chicago 
and opened a store where two or three other men had failed. He 
went right into the same business, too, and the people wondered 
how he kept going. By and by it came out that he had a very 
rich brother. So have you a rich brother, and He will supply all 
your needs." 

Some of the statistics of the Philadelphia meetings read 
almost like romance. From November 21, 1875, to Februarys 
1876, the aggregate attendance was 1,050,000. The average daily 
attendance, including the several meetings held every day, was 
22,000. On one Sunday 28,000 persons were present at the dif- 
ferent services. A committee of ladies gave out in one week 
19,000 tickets to persons who acknowledged that they were not 
Christians. The blessed results of the meetings were long mani- 
fest and formed an era in the religious life of the Quaker City and 
vicinity. 

TESTIMONY FROM THE CHOIR LEADER. 

Professor W. J. Fischer, of Philadelphia, gained a reputation 
for the masterly manner in which he trained the great choir of 
800 voices that sang in the old freight depot of the Pennsylvania 
Railroad during the first Moody and Sankey revival in that city. 
Later his name became associated more closely with those of the 
two great Evangelists by reason of his setting to music several of 
the more favorite hymns of the dead leader. 

Professor Fischer said: "The Evangelists came home from 
England, and, following the meeting in Brooklyn, the largest con- 
tinuous gathering that the two Evangelists ever addressed assem- 
bled in Philadelphia. The movement was started by a few prom- 
inent clergymen in town, and hundreds took it up. The only 
place of sufficient size in which to hold the crowd that promised 
to come was the old depot at Thirteenth and Market streets. We 
gathered from churches, both in this State and outside, a body of 
800 of the finest voices in the East, and welded them into a choir, 
which Mr. Moody declared he had never heard equaled. 

u The meeting continued every evening for three months, and 



118 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

the attendance daily was abont 16,000. The effect in the town 
was thrilling, although cynics scoffed and poked fun. The mis- 
sion of Mr. Moody found fruit here, and his appearance was wel- 
comed ever afterward with joy. Many of the most prominent 
persons in the country attended the meetings during their continu- 
ance, and President Grant was several times an interested spec- 
tator. The entire affair was squarely honest and a sincere work. 
Not a cent was paid to any one, and the critics who sometimes 
derided it as a money-making affair did the sort of harm that is 
contemptible. 

NOT ANOTHER LIKE HIM. 

"Mr. Moody had very little music in him, and with difficulty 
could tell one note from another, yet he would often go into strange 
places and dives and open up with a hymn that, notwithstanding 
the lack of harmony, won everybody by its truth. Yes, I think 
he was a wonderful man, and I think we shall not see another so 
whole-souled for a long time." 

Mr. Moody's great work in the immense Hippodrome building 
of New York city was begun on Monday night, the 7th of Feb- 
ruary, 1876. People said to him, "You will not do much in New 
York; it is a hard city; you will not succeed there." His reply 
was, "Is not the God of our fathers enough for New York city? 
Cannot our God take this city and shake it as you would a little 
child ?" This faith was well founded, for if ever New York was 
shaken it was during this marvellous series of evangelistic meetings. 

In the presence of a vast multitude and surrounded by the 
most prominent ministers and business men of the metropolis, 
Mr. Moody preached his first sermon from the words : " But God 
hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the mighty, 
and foolish things of the world to confound the wise; that no flesh 
should glory in his presence." 

The most elaborate preparations had been made in the big 
Hippodrome for holding the services, a very efficient commitee and 
corps of helpers having been organized long before the Evangelists 
arrived. Mr. Moody declared that up to this time he had never 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 119 

received better assistance. The first week had not ended before the 
average daily attendance on the combined services amounted to 
20,000. 

It is not necessary here to give detailed accounts of the great 
work in New York, for the reason that in its essential features it 
was precisely like the work which has been fully described in other 
places. There was the same curiosity, the same great outpourings 
of people, the same prayerful earnestness, the same thrilling 
scenes in the inquiry-rooms, the same magnificent leadership, and 
the same impressive effects produced by Mr. Sankey's songs. 

AN EMPEROR ON THE PLATFORM. 

At one of the services the Emperor of Brazil, Dom Pedro II, 
with some friends, sat on the platform in seats reserved for them. 
The Emperor was greatly moved by one of Mr. Sankey's hymns, 
and deeply interested in Mr. Moody's discourse. It has been said 
that some of Mr. Moody's sentences were rather pointed, to which 
the only reply that could be made was that he did not have an 
Emperor to preach to every day. 

On the other hand, it was said that Mr. Moody did not know 
the Emperor was present. Opening his eyes in amazement he 
remarked : ' ' Why ! I thought it must be some warm-hearted 
Methodist preacher, just come in from the country." 

One grand result of these meetings was the help given to the 
Young Men's Christian Association of New York city. Wherever 
Mr. Moody went he interested himself in the work of the Associa- 
tion, and his strongest appeals were made on its behalf. 

It is not essential to a history of Mr. Moody's work in this 
country to follow him from one city to another through all his 
brilliant career. He visited nearly all the towns of any consider- 
able size, and stirred their religious life to its lowest depths. From 
Hartford, where the Rink that held 3000 persons was filled to over- 
flowing, at all the day and evening meetings, resulting in over 
1200 conversions, he carried the work to New Haven and assailed 
the citadel of young manhood in Yale College. It was a remark- 
able spectacle, this rude, unlettered man, commanding the atten- 



120 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

tion, even the admiration, of one of the foremost universities of the 
world. 

In Mr. Moody's later years he broadened and developed in a 
way that caused surprise. He was quick to learn, ready to adapt 
himself to circumstances, and grew both intellectually and spiritu- 
ally. His last services at Kansas City called out vast multitudes, 
and Convention Hall, holding many thousands, was packed to 
listen to his appeals. 

MOODY'S FAMOUS SCHOOLS. 

In this connection it will be fitting to note the great educa- 
tional work he carried on and the institutions he founded. These 
institutions are unique in character, and offer an unequaled oppor- 
tunity for young men and women of limited means to secure an 
education that will throughly equip them for Christian life and 
service. They consist of the Northfield Seminary and Training 
School for young women, Mount Hermon School for young men, 
and the Bible Institute, Chicago. All are incorporated. 

For twelve or fifteen years before his death the energies of 
Mr. Moody were chiefly devoted to a work peculiarly adapted to 
the needs of the present time — the training of young men and 
women as lay workers in the churches, the stimulation of inactive 
Christians, and the consecration of student lives to missionary 
service. It would be a useless task to weigh these two periods of 
his life against each other — the revival period and the educational 
period — to determine which has been of the more lasting value to 
the cause of Christ. Each has met a great need. The methods 
used to train Christian workers and promote evangelism in the 
churches have centred at Northfield and at Chicago. 

In the former town, on opposite sides of the beautiful Con- 
necticut River, Mr. Moody founded the Mount Hermon School for 
boys and the Northfield Seminary for young women. At Chicago 
he founded — with the liberal support of Chicago business men — 
the Bible Institute. Though some thoughtful Christian people 
have differed from some of the methods employed, there has never 
been any question of the high motives and the widely helpful 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 121 

results of this work to which Mr. Moody gave his mature judg- 
meut and his loving care. 

The Northfield plant consists of about 1200 acres of land 
and about thirty buildings, beautifully situated and excellently 
equipped. With present endowment it is valued at one and a 
quarter millions, and is practically free from debt. At Chicago 
the buildings, land and endowment exceed $250,000 in value. The 
Northfield schools have about 400 students each, who are charged 
$100 per annum for board and tuition. The actual cost is about 
$200. At Chicago the amount required approximates $150 each 
for 300 students. 

VAST SUM REQUIRED FOR THE INSTITUTIONS. 

In brief, therefore, a sum of about $125,000 is annually re- 
quired to maintain the work inaugurated by Mr. Moody on the 
principles successfully pursued for many years. This was largely 
raised by his personal efforts. His friends wished to express their 
appreciation of him and their gratitude to God for his accomplished 
work by sharing the responsibilities bequeathed to his children by 
raising the limited endowment to $3,000,000, the interest on which, 
at four per cent., would guarantee the perpetuation of his work in 
all its prosperity. Such an endowment would be a monument to 
his memory more enduring than brass or marble, and just such a 
memorial as he himself would have most desired. 

The seminary at Northfield was established primarily for the 
daughters of the farmers of that section who could not afford to 
send them to existing educational institutions. The idea had been 
conceived as early as 1875, when Mr. Moody had resolved to make 
Northfield his permanent home. Driving through the country he 
came, one day, upon a poor home before which he saw a mother 
and two daughters braiding willow baskets. The father was a 
paralytic, and helpless. Deeply affected by the evidences of priva- 
tion and of the narrow life and meagre opportunities to which the 
young women were subject, but examples of many, he decided 
that his efforts should be directed toward securing for them better 
things. 



122 MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 

The founding of the school followed. He first purchased a 
few acres of barren farm land in the front of his own house on 
which to erect a suitable building for his school, but without wait- 
ing for this improvement he opened a school in his own home with 
eight pupils quartered in an extension which he built to his house. 
Soon he had twenty-five pupils. From that the school had grown 
to 400 students. There are 210 acres of land, eight dormitories, a 
gymnasium, a library, a recitation hall, an auditorium, and farm 
buildings. Over 2300 students were trained in its halls up to the 
time of Moody's death. So great are the demands upon it that 
many pupils are annually turned away. 

STUDENTS DEVELOP INTO MISSIONARIES. 

Many of the students leave the seminary to engage in mis- 
sionary work at home and abroad, while others take a course pre- 
paratory for university work, but a large proportion, of course, 
return to their homes after a term or two at the school, and they 
have made the name of Northfield a familiar one through a wide 
section. 

The establishment of the school for boys next engaged Mr. 
Moody's attention, and the beautifnl home of the institution at 
Mount Hermon followed. This started on a larger scale than had 
the seminary. It boasts of a recitation hall, science hall, chapel, 
dormitories, and twelve cottages, with a farm of 800 acres. Its 
faculty numbers twenty-six, and the students nearly 400 annually, 
many of whom are fitted for Yale, Harvard, and other New Eng- 
land colleges, while others are fitted for missionary work. As with 
the girls, the majority receive their final training here. 

Courses in Bible study, dressmaking and cooking are given 
at the Bible Training School. In addition to the arduous duties 
the care of these enterprises involved, he superintended the famous 
summer conferences at Northfield, attended by thousands from all 
parts of the United States and many other parts of the world ; 
spoke at revivals all over the country, and excercised personal 
supervision over his Bible Institute in Chicago. 

Out of the Northfield schools have grown two of the most sig- 



MOODY'S GREAT WORK IN AMERICA. 123 

nificaut religious movements of the century — the Student Volun- 
teer Movement and the Northfield summer conferences. In both 
of these Mr. Moody has been the leading spirit. In both he has 
shown two qualities that have grown with the years until they 
won for him the respect of all and the love of thousands: his 
never-failing kindly common sense, which might be compared to 
Abraham Lincoln's, and his tolerance. These were qualities that 
made him a favorite with students. 

To see Mr. Moody with a crowd of Harvard and Yale and 
Princeton men on old "Rouud Top" at the sunset hour, guiding 
them upward to the throne of grace, was a sight to bring strange 
thrills to careless hearts. Moody on the city platform, earnest, 
practical, colloquial, humorous, persuasive, pathetic, was a leader 
to study and to admire. Moody among his "boys" there on the 
hill, with every eye turned upon him as he spoke of the divine 
love and the joy of service, while the shadows fell quietly over the 
valley until the river was quite hidden and only the afterglow 
lightened the western sky — this man was a brother to be loved. 

That is a sight we shall see no more. He has passed beyond 
the sunset, facing always heavenward. But he wist not that his 
face shone. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Mr. Moody's Ministry to Men. 

BY BISHOP WILLARD F. MALLALIEU. 

( NE of tlie peculiarities of the times in which we live is the 
marked absence of men from the public worship of God on 
the Sabbath. As a rule a large proportion of the average 
congregation is composed of women. There must be reasons 
for this condition of things. It will not do to assume that any- 
one reason will afford a sufficient explanation. Manifestly there 
are three or four reasons that have a very direct bearing upon the 
problem. 

First of all, it is evident that the modern, reckless rush of 
business so taxes the mental and physical strength of men, that, 
when Sunday dawns upon this working world, all toilers, whether 
of hand or brain, are very much inclined to make it a day of rest, 
and, if not prevented by religious scruples, a day of recreation. 
There must be an occasional interval when toil ceases or the 
strongest and most enduring constitutions will certainly break 
down. 

Evidently it has not occurred to many of these toilers that one 
way, and, indeed, one of the best ways, to rest and refresh both 
body and mind is to lay aside the usual work-day clothing, put on 
the Sunday suit, and go to church, and so enjoy the singing, give 
interested attention to all the services, and mingle with the people. 
For one day in the week, at least, this will break up the monotony 
of life; and toil ceases to be a drudgery when these restful seasons 
are both regular and frequent. 

In this connection it must not be forgotten that the vast 

changes that have taken place in our modes of life within recent 

years have most seriously affected the status of working men and 

women. Fifty, even forty, years ago there was very little work on 

124 



MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 125 

Sunday, except that of mercy and necessity. In those days there 
were no Sunday trolleys, no lailroad passenger trains, no freight 
trains, no open places of amusement, no misnamed sacred concerts, 
no public performances in public squares and commons and parks 
by brass bands — in fact, but very little, if any, open and inexcus- 
able desecration of the holy day. Now we have them all. The 
change in the business and social affairs of our rapidly growing 
and very heterogeneous nation involves the employment of large 
numbers of men on the Sabbath, and, by consequence, they are 
prevented from attendance on public worship, even if they were so 
disposed. Hundreds of thousands are thus deprived of Sabbath 
rights and privileges or they are thrown out of their positions, so 
that they must work on Sunday or starve. 

MANY THOUSANDS EMPLOYED ON SUNDAY. 

Then the Sunday newspaper that lives and thrives from one 
end of our country to the other, not only involves the running of 
special railroad trains, but the employment of many tens of thou- 
sands of men and boys in selling and distributing. These papers 
are not religious, they are very far from it. Many of them are full 
of foul reports, and they are the chroniclers of scandals and crime. 
Not a few of them in their spirit and tendency are thoroughly 
immoral. 

Notwithstanding all this these papers go into millions of our 
homes every Sunday morning, and there is not one of them all 
that can be considered helpful to the development of religious 
thought, or pure intellectual culture. These papers are utterly 
worldly, and a large percentage of them are unfit to be tolerated 
in Christian homes. The men who read these papers are, for the 
most part, tempted to stay away from church, and multitudes yield 
to the temptation. 

Again it cannot be successfully denied that there is a decided 
drift towards skepticism on the part of great numbers of men. 
This drift has been fostered and stimulated, if not created, by the 
absurd hypotheses of our so-called modern science. Possibly the 
worst results come from the theories of evolutionists. The-? 



126 MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 

theories are in direct opposition to the teachings of the Bible in 
regard to the origin of man; they eliminate from the life the 
supernatural so far as prophecy and miracle are concerned; they 
leave no place for the testimony of the Word of God in regard to 
the supernatural origin of the human nature of Jesus ; they do 
not assume to recognize the immortality of the soul. 

MEN WHO HAVE NO USE FOR CHURCHES. 

This modern form of undiluted and crass materialism is 
really as old as the mud philosophy of Egypt and the atomic 
theory of Greece, is essentially destructive to all forms of religious 
faith and worship and leaves man in a helpless and hopeless con- 
dition in regard to a future life. Logically enough when men 
accept these views and theories they have very little use for 
churches or public worship. Then if, in addition to all this, we 
have authorized religious teachers who hold and promulgate these 
umbiblical and unchristian ideas, and moreover spend a good share 
of their time in tearing the Bible to shreds, and attempting to 
prove its untrustworthiness, is it at all remarkable that busy, hard- 
worked, earnest men should turn away from the sanctuary, and 
restrain prayer, and cast off the fear of God, and }^ear by year 
drift heathenward, and in many cases with sadly accelerated 
velocity ? 

Now the whole world knows that Dwight L. Moody stood 
boldly, manfully and squarely against all these things that have 
been mentioned and others more or less intimately related to them. 
On the other hand, it is known and universally conceded that first, 
last and always he was the friend of the working man. He most 
strenuously opposed the oppression of the poor. In the interest of 
all toilers he antagonized the desecration of the Sabbath, not only 
because it is a violation of the divine command, but because it is a 
cruelty inflicted upon every son of honest labor, and upon wives 
and children. 

He knew very well that the Sunday newspaper is one of the 
worst enemies of the Sabbath institution, and of the holy convo- 
cation of the people for the purpose of public worship. He had 



MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 127 

not the remotest sympathy for the oppositions of science, falsely 
so-called, nor for the destructive rationalistic criticism of the pres- 
ent day, that discredits the reliability of the Word of God ; and, he 
did not fear to declare his convictions in regard to these two insidi- 
ous but deadly foes of the Gospel and the house of God. 

His pronounced views and intense antagonism of these all too 
prevalent evils did not hinder men from attending the preaching 
of Mr. Moody. Men of brains and good sense, men who have 
ideas and convictions of their own, are not possessed of itching ears. 
They are not found crowding the pews of invertebrate preachers. 
They are not much given to seeking for preachers who deal in 
weak and lachrymose platitudes, or use only honeyed words. 

MEN LIKE POINTED PREACHING. 

A real stalwart mans likes a preacher that probes his con- 
science, that compels him to look straight into his own heart, that 
sets him to thinking about the ultimate outcome of his personal 
conduct. Men knew when they listened to Mr. Moody that he was 
a man among men ; that he had a great throbbing heart akin to 
their own ; they knew that he was no doctrinaire with abundant 
learning, and very little or no real common sense ; they knew that 
whether he had more or less of scholarship he certainly understood 
the daily life of men, and that he could search through their in- 
most souls, holding aloft the blazing torch of divine truth. Men 
like to hear such a preacher, and they will go to hear him, and 
they went to hear Mr. Moody. 

Dwight Lyman Moody was a prophet of God ! When one of 
the flaming chariots of the heavens swung low on Friday noon of 
the twenty-second of December, 1899, he stepped in and ascended 
to the eternal glory. This supreme century has produced no such 
prophet as he who has walked and lived among us for the past sixty- 
two years. Indeed the century has produced very few men who 
can be considered his equals, especially when we have an adequate 
conception of the extent and power of his influence to mold and 
fashion the lives of men. 

He was familiarly known wherever the English language is 



128 MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 

spoken, for though he had not travelled extensively in foreign 
lands, yet his various books, and the books that have been written 
about him, and the Gospel Hymns which have been scattered far 
and wide by multiplied millions have carried his name and fame to 
the ends of the earth. Humanity owes him a debt of gratitude 
which it can never repay, and the debt will continually increase as 
the years go on. 

For all time his name will be written with the names of Fin- 
ney, Edwards, Asbury, Wesley, Whitfield, Luther, Huss, Wicliff, 
and other prophets, " Who through faith subdued kingdoms, 
wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of 
lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, 
out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned 
to flight the armies of the aliens." Men always loved to hear such 
prophets as these, and they loved to hear Mr. Moody, and they 
went to hear him as they have gone to hear no other. 

BENEFACTOR OF YOUNG MEN. 

Pre-eminently he was a benefactor of men, especially of young 
men, who waited on his ministry. He possessed to a very unusual 
degree those native qualities and characteristics that command the 
confidence and loyal following of men, whether young or old. Not 
all but some of them may be mentioned, at the same time suggest- 
ing that the elements of success are measurably within the reach 
of all, and that in proportion as they are possessed, developed and 
utilized will be the influence and usefulness resulting from asso- 
ciation with men. 

It seems somewhat paradoxical, and yet it is eminently true, 
that his nature was composite, and in him two decided opposites 
were most happily combined. There was something about him as 
attractive and beautiful as the blue Connecticut winding through 
the lovely meadows and beside the graceful slopes of Northfield 
Valley, while there was also something about him as rugged and 
strong and stable as the forest-clad craggy hills where he was 
reared. Men enjoy this combination of opposite qualities in a 
preacher, for it appeals to what they themselves know and feel. 






MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 129 

Again, he knew men and things ; he knew truth and God. 
His early life on the farm, his experience in business as a clerk, 
his service in the Christian Commission during the Civil War, his 
continual mingling with men, gave him an abundance of practical 
knowledge in regard to the affairs of daily life. In the various 
enterprises which he instituted and carried forward to success, he 
showed such aptitude in planning, directing and controlling that 
he commended himself to earnest, thorough and successful busi- 
ness men. 

DEVOTED STUDENT OF THE BIBLE. 

He knew the truth as the result of the most persistent and 
honest study of the Bible. If ever the sufficiency and excellence 
of the English translation of the Bible has been illustrated it was 
in his case. Without knowing a word of Greek or Hebrew, he 
sought for the treasures of wisdom stored in the sacred volume, and 
he found them, and gave them to the people in rich abundance. 

He knew God in personal and abiding communion. He took 
the divine challenge, a Ye shall seek for me, and find me, when ye 
shall search for me with all your heart." He found God and 
walked with Him for years in blessed fellowship as real as that of 
Enoch. Like Stephen of old he was full of faith and the Holy 
Ghost. Thus equipped he was a veritable dynamo of power, and 
whenever and wherever he touched the world men were compelled 
to acknowledge that his was a masterful spirit, and so as he led 
they followed. 

Dwight Moody with all his soul despised and hated shams of 
any and every kind and quality. Life was to him a tremendous 
reality, and he was tremendously real. Wherever he went he in- 
variably created this impression of himself. He never wore a 
mask and never attempted to conceal his real thought and purpose. 
He was candid to the last degree and was as honest in all his being 
as the sunlight. 

There was not the slightest trace of the modern effeminate, 
emasculated namby-pambyism about his thought, speech or 
methods. He was a broad-gauge, noble, virile, whole-souled man. 



130 MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 

Nobody ever took him for a weakling. He did not need petting 
and flattery. He stood out before the world as a man of strength 
both in purpose and action. 

He never affected to be more than he really was. He did not 
think more highly of himself than he ought, but his personalit}- 
was most pronounced. He was himself alwa}^s and everywhere. 
He was perfect^ sincere. He lived in the full light of unclouded 
noonday with all the windows of his soul wide open to all the uni- 
verse. There is small occasion for subterfuge or concealment on 
the part of honest people, and he was so absolutely honest that it 
never occurred to him that there was anything to be concealed. 

HIS UNIVERSITY WAS THE COUNTRY SCHOOL. 

It is true that he held no college diplomas. The New England 
District School was his only Alma Mater, and yet all his life long 
he was most eager to learn. With unfeigned delight he could sit 
at the feet of any real teacher who excelled him in knowledge ; 
but he had his own convictions in regard to all questions of doc- 
trines and experience. These convictions were not vagaries ; they 
were not the offspring of fanaticism. These convictions were not 
reached by an}- hasty generalizations ; as a rule they were slowly 
and cautiously formed, and, in the last analysis, only those were 
retained that were based on what to him were the clean and explicit 
teachings of the Word of God. 

The Bible was the touchstone by which he invariably tested all 
theories and the standard by which he weighed and measured his 
own conclusions and experiences. He would build only on the 
solid rock of divine truth, and never on the ever-shifting sands of 
worldly, intellectual speculations. 

His whole public life was a continual exemplification of the 
fact that he never sought for personal financial gain or emolument. 
He might easily have accumulated an abundant fortune ; he might 
have left large wealth to his family, but he did neither. If ever a 
man illustrated the theory of John Wesley, to get all possible, to 
save all possible, and then give all gotten and saved, Mr. Moody did 
just this to a most singular degree. More than this, it may be said 



MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 131 

of him that he never sought for the good-will or applause of his 
fellow-men by any compromise with any form of iniquity or world- 
liness, no matter how popular, nor by surrendering in the slighest 
degree his inborn conviction of truth and duty. 

He would probably have come over in the Mayflower with 
Miles Standish if he had been in Holland at the time the Pilgrims 
were leaving, and he would have stood on the bleak hill-top at 
P^mouth and watched the lone ship in the offing as she spread her 
white wings for her return voyage, and not a sigh or murmur 
would have escaped his lips or heaved his breast, and not a tear of 
regret would have brimmed his eyelids. He would have been 
among those who said, It is ours to break the ice through with 
bleeding, freezing feet, if so we may open the way for men to 
worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, 
and read the Bible each for himself with none to molest or make 
afraid. 

A MAN WHO NEVER KNEW FEAR. 

If he had lived in the time of Cromwell he would have marched 
beside that greatest of Englishmen with his unconquerable Iron- 
sides. He was completely fearless. It is altogether doubtful if he 
knew the meaning of the word fear as applied to men and things. 
And why should he fear ? He had a iconscience void of offence 
toward God and man, and so with his face to the sunlight he went 
boldly forward in the discharge of every duty. It was never a 
question with him, "how many, but where are the enemy?" 

If he had been in Luther's place in Wartburg Castle undoubt- 
edly he would have thrown the historic ink-stand with a better aim 
and a steadier and more vigorous hand than did Luther ; and 
most likely he would have grappled with the intruder and thrust 
him headlong out of the narrow window. In the olden times ; yes, 
in these times, men look up to other men who are fearless. Leaders 
of men are never the craven, trembling cowards that are forever 
taking good care of their own precious bodies and souls. 

He was truthful to the last degree. Like General Grant, he 
would stop talking when he came to the end of truth telling. No 



132 MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 

man ever doubted his word. The cunning arts of diplomacy, and 
the baser arts of duplicity were absolutely foreign to his nature 
and his ingrained principles. 

His conscience was quick as the apple of the eye, and tender 
as the heart of an angel, but it was well and wisely trained and 
properly balanced, and also thoroughly informed and inspired by 
his extraordinary knowledge of the unchangeable, inerrant and 
absolutely infallible Word of God. 

He was constant and steadfast in all the work and duties of 
public and private life, and was always hopeful and cheerful even 
amid the sorest disappointments. He was free from the slightest 
suspicion of moroseness, he was never gloomy or despondent, he was 
not over-reticent or taciturn; indeed, he possessed a vein of genuine 
humor that sometimes sparkled with keenest and kindliest wit ; but 
he was never light and trifling, never frivolous, never giddy, never 
inane and foolish. He lived too near to God, and his fellowship 
with Jesus was too intimate and unbroken to admit of frivolity. 

In him was realized the answer to the prayer. Would that it 
might be realized in thousands of others : 

1 ' Lord give us men ! 

Strong and stalwart ones ; 
Men whom highest hope inspires, 
Men whom purest honor fires, 
Men who trample self beneath them, 
Men who make their country wreath them 

As her noble sons 

Worthy of their sires ! 
Men who never shame their mothers, 
Men who never fail their brothers, 
Men who tread where saints have trod, 
Men for country, home and God, 

Lord, give us men ! ' ' 

Then, to crown all, his close touch with the poor and lowly, 
whose daily life and struggles he knew so well ; his personal ap- 
prehension of the infinite compassion and love of God for human- 
ity so wrought upon his entire being that his divinely and gra- 
ciously renewed heart became the source of the most genuine and 
ardent sympathy for all men, and apparently obliterated in him all 
traces of selfishness and unworthy ambition, so that it may be said 






MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 133 

of him that lie lived not for himself but for others. Men every- 
where, and almost all of them, admire pure, unmixed self-sacrifice, 
they prize most highly freedom from selfishness, and they are will- 
ing to follow men who are free from whatever is sordid and base. 

It is a sad mistake when men suppose that learning gained in 
the schools, that culture and refinement, that wealth and social 
position are absolutely essential to the greatest possible usefulness. 
It is character that counts. Holy living, which is the outward 
manifestation of holy, Christ-like character, is more influential, 
more potent for good than all eloquence, than all learning, than all 
superficial culture. One may have all these natural and acquired 
gifts and graces, and not having Christ-like character may live a 
very worthless life. 

HE WAS A BROTHERLY MAN. 

Then, if this character be possessed, the additional important 
element that is needed to insure supreme usefulness is plain, simple 
brotherliness. There must be in the make-up of every man who 
would move humanity upward and God-ward a touch of nature that 
makes all men akin. To benefit the lowliest and the humblest the 
arms of love and faith must reach down to the nethermost stratum 
of society. It greatly helps if one has been there himself; yes, if 
he originally came from there. The Captain of our salvation was 
made perfect through suffering. He was born in a stable, the only 
refuge His mother could find in the home of her royal ancestor ; 
his cradle was a manger, and he had not where, even at his best 
estate, a place of his own where he might lay his head. 

It was distinctly to Mr. Moody's advantage that in early life 
he was inured to poverty and toil ; that his poor widowed mother 
had hard work to keep the wolf from the door. How else could he 
have come so near, and always in a helpful way, to the great masses 
of working people, if he had not known all about the hardships 
incident to a very scant subsistence in early life ? 

Thus constituted and nurtured, it is not strange that he had a 
most astonishing influence over men, especially over young men. 
In spite of the unpromising character of his youthful environment, 



134 MR. MOODY'S MINISTRY TO MEN. 

his meagre scholastic opportunities, the multiplied obstacles and 
discouragements that were thrown and piled in his way by short- 
sighted though well-meaning friends, how surprising, indeed, how 
glorious, his career. And is not this career well calculated to 
humble all preachers who complain that men do not throng the 
sanctuaries where they minister when they remember how need- 
lessly they are unlike this honored servant of God ? 

VAST RESULTS OF HIS GREAT LABORS. 

During his public life it is estimated that his congregations 
would aggregate not less than one hundred millions of people. 
Of this vast multitude at least twenty-five millions were young 
men. By his word and example, by his unreserved consecration 
and his quenchless zeal, by his tender sympathy and heartfelt 
love unnumbered thousands of these were made better for all time; 
while scores of thousands of them were turned from sin to right- 
eousness and brought into the fold of the Good Shepherd. 

Magnificent man, faithful Christian, peerless Evangelist of 
the Nineteenth Century, he has left us! We shall never again in 
this life behold his manly form ; never again listen to his startling 
pleading voice; never again will his earnest prayers bring us near 
the mercy seat. His work is done, though his influence will abide 
through all time. Our upward longing gaze follows him as earth 
recedes, and heaven opens, and God calls, until we see him pass 
the gate of pearl. Beholding now the King in his beauty, he walks 
the streets of gold, he wears his crown in paradise. 

If we may not equal him in his high achievements, may God 
grant that, at least, the shadow of his falling mantle may rest 
upon us, and so our souls be moved to fuller consecration, to holier 
ambitions, and to more faithful, heroic and unselfish service and 
sacrifice than we have ever known in all the past. 



'hr^HaUMc, 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Funeral Services of Mr. Moody at Northfield. 

"/\/l R * ^OODY had three great temptatious in his life," said 
* » * one who knew him well, in conversation with the writer, 
regarding the last honrs of the great Evangelist. "In his youth 
he was tempted by poverty before which many a man has fallen, 
but poverty proved a stepping-stone to him. Then came his great 
temptation of prosperity and popularity, which have carried down 
a great multitude of good men, but he used them as means of doing 
greater good than he could have done without them. Then in his 
last illness he was tempted by weakness, even helplessness, and 
he used them as means of comforting others." 

"But sometimes when adown the Western sky 

A fiery sunset lingers, 
Its golden gate swings inward noiselessly, 

Unlocked by unseen fingers. 

"And while they stand a moment half ajar, 

Gleams from the inner glory 
Stream brightly through the azure vault afar, 

And half reveal the story." 

Mr. Moody knew early on the morning of December 2 2d, that 
he could not live ; he passed away at noon. There were experi- 
ences in the last four hours that were not unexpected by those 
who knew the childlike faith of this man of God. He was natural, 
patient, thoughtful, to the last. Knowing that the end was fast 
approaching, the only fear seemed to be that his hard breathing 
might disturb his loved oues. In the early morning, coming out 
of a sinking spell, he said: "If this is death, there is no valley. 
This is glorious. I have been within the gates and I saw the 
children, D wight and Irene" (his two grandchildren who had 
died). 

His beautiful testimony : " Earth is receding. Heaven is 

135 



13G FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

approaching. God is calling me," were among his last words, but 
those which were spoken last related more especially to his wife 
and children. In speaking of his death, he said that he had been 
an ambitions man, not to make money, but to have work to do, 
and he added: "I think it is time that I made my will now. Will, 
yon may have the Mt. Hermon School to look after. Paul, you 
may have the Seminary when you are fitted for it. Emma, you 
•and Percy (her husband), take care of the Bible Institute in 
Chicago." 

"What about mother?" asked one of the children. 

" Oh, she is like Eve ; she is the mother of us all," he 
replied, with his old time smile. Then he placed his hand affec- 
tionately in that of the noble woman who has been in very truth 
a helpmeet for nearly forty years, and said : " You have been a 
good wife to me." 

As the doctor saw him about to faint again, he went to his 
bedside to give another hypodermic injection. 

" Is there anything gained by this ?" asked Mr. Moody. 

" Nothing except to give you strength and relieve your suf 
fering." 

THOUGHTFUL OF OTHERS TO THE LAST. 

" Then, I think we will stop, for it is only prolonging the 
suffering of those who are dear to me." 

And with this consideration for his wife and children he 
passed away, or to use his own words, spoken a few months ago : 

"He is gone up higher — that is all; gone out of this old 
tenement into a house that is immortal, into a body that death 
cannot touch, that sin cannot taint, a body fashioned like unto 
His own glorious body." 

This deathbed testimony is given at some length to explain 
the remarkable funeral which was held on Tuesday afternoon, 
December 26. It was truly a Christian burial service. The key- 
note was struck when Dr. C. I. Scofield, the pastor of the Congre- 
gational Church in East Northfleld said, at the opening of the 
service : 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 137 

u We are not here to mourn a defeat, but to celebrate a 
victor}'. " 

Mr. Moody died as lie lived, a victor. He was buried as be 
died — a victor. There was, indeed, no martial music nor stately 
parade following a plumed hearse. In fact, there was neither 
hearse, nor funeral music, nor tolling bells, nor crape, nor veils 
to hide faces suffused in tears. Tears there were in the eyes of 
every one of the large congregation present. But there was no 
weeping, and the calmest faces in the church were those of the 
immediate family. The resignation manifested by Mrs. Moody 
was that of one whose husband had entered into joys unspeakable, 
which await her also, and which she is to share with him. 

PRESENT STRENGTH IN SORROW. 

" I hope no one will speak of me as fatherless," said the 
daughter, in the morning, to a friend. The clear voice of the 
elder son's wife was heard in the Gospel hymns manifesting sweet 
resignation ; there was no suggestion of the death of two children, 
the serious illness of her father and the death of her devoted 
father -in-law, all within a year. The sons were as interested as 
if they were attending a meeting led by their father. The entire 
family were wonderfully sustained. 

The day of the funeral was a perfect day — " one of the Lord's 
own days," a visitor called it. The sun rose clear over the 
mountain, at whose feet Northfield nestles. In the distance, on 
the foothills of the Green Mountains, patches of snow appeared. 
The morning was frosty, but in the afternoon, as the friends gath- 
ered for the service, the temperature had risen several degrees. 
Large parties from Boston, New York and other cities arrived 
soon after noon. A special train from Brattleboro, Vt, brought 
many friends. There were many well known clergymen and 
laymen present in addition to those taking part in the services. 
Besides Ira D. Sankey, Mr. Moody's associate for nearly thirty 
years, who was accompanied by his wife, there were three of Mr. 
Moody's singers in the audience — George C. Stebbins, D. R, 
Towner and F. H. Jacobs. 



138 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

Passing Mr. Moody's house in the forenoon, a stranger would 
not have thought that death had been a recent visitor. No signs 
of mourning appeared. No crape was seen , on the door. The 
window blinds were all open. People entered the house as if going 
to a reception. Inside, after the service, they sat in the library 
and parlor chatting pleasantly. Their conversation was mainly 
about Mr. Moody, recalling incidents in his eventful career, help- 
ful words which he had spoken and deeds of kindness which he 
had done. At 10 o'clock, Dr. Scofield and Dr. R. A. Torrey, the 
pastor of the Chicago Avenue Church, and the superintendent of 
the Bible Institute in Chicago, conducted a service consisting of 
Scripture selections and a prayer. Then the body was carried to 
the church a half mile distant, on a bier by thirty-two students 
from the Mt. Hermon School. At 2.30 p. m., the public service 
began. 

BEAUTIFUL FLORAL TRIBUTES, 

Christmas greens festooned the galleries of the church, while 
on the coffin and about it were appropriate floral tributes from the 
trustees, faculties and students of the several institutions in North- 
field and in Chicago. At the head was a pillow, in which a crown 
had been worked in white, with a purple ribbon on which Mr. 
Moody's words were seen, " God is calling me." An open Bible 
with ''Victory. I Corinthians, xv: 55-57," on the left side and "II 
Timothy iv:7,8," on the other, rested at the foot. Palms, ferns, 
laurel, violets, cut flowers and callas were placed about the pulpit. 
When the cover of the cloth-covered cofEn was removed, the face 
and hands were plainly visible from every part of the church. As 
the sun was setting a single ray entered a blind and rested upon 
the cofiin. Gradually it rose until it reached the face of the friend 
so dearly loved by a multitude of people. This beautiful incident 
was at once noticed by the large assembly present at the services. 
With evening coming on and with the shadows deepening in the 
room the effect of this stray sunbeam seemed like a light sent 
from "within the gates." 

Dr. Scofield had charge of the services which began with the 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 139 

hymn, " A Little While," composed by Major Whittle and James 
McGranahan. The following is the first stanza: 

"A little while I" and He shall come ; 

The hour draws on apace, 
The blessed hour, the glorious morn 

When we shall see His face : 
How light our trials then will seem ! 

How short our pilgrim way ! 
Our life on earth a fitful dream, 

Dispelled by dawning day ! 

Chorus. 

Then come, Lord Jesus, quickly come, 

In glory and in light ! 
Come, take thy longing children home, 
And end earth' s weary night. 

THE PASTOR'S APPROPRIATE ADDRESS. 

After the hymn Dr. Scofield offered an invocation, Dr. Arthnr 
T. Pierson read the Scripture lesson, and Dr. George C. Needham 
prayed. " Immanuel's Land" was the second hymn. Dr. Scofield 
said in his address : 

" This is not the place, nor am I the man to present a study 
of the life and character of Dwight L. Moody. This will follow. 
Bnt some things at least press to be said. Some things are so 
snre that no lapse of time, no quieter afterthought can unsettle 
them. No one will ever question that we are to-day laying in the 
kindly bosom of the earth the mortal body of a great man. 

" Whether we measure greatness by qualities of character, by 
qualities of intellect, or by things done, Dwight L. Moody must 
be accounted great. The basis of Mr. Moody's character was 
sincerity, genuineness. He had an inveterate aversion to all forms 
of sham, unreality, and pretense. Most of all did he detest reli- 
gious pretense, cant. At this point he held high and stern opin- 
ions. But nowhere did he apply them so relentlessly as in the 
sphere of his own life. In no morbid sense an introspective man, 
he was yet always testing his foundations at this point. Along 
with this fundamental quality, Mr. Moody cherished a great love 
of righteousness. 



140 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

"His first question concerning any proposed action was, * Is it 
right?' But these two qualities, necessarily at the bottom of all 
noble character, were in him suffused and transfigured by divine 
grace. Sensitive beyond most men upon the point of righteous- 
ness, Mr. Moody never doubted the power of God's grace to recon- 
struct the most defective character ; and where he could see in any 
man a longing for this, his patience was inexhaustible. Besides 
all this, Mr. Moody was in a wonderful degree brave, magnan- 
imous, and unselfish. We are not here to extol Mr. Moody after 
the flesh. Doubtless, this unlettered New England country boy 
became what he was by the grace of God. But the law of the 
bestowal of the talents is clear: 'To every man according to his 
several ability.' 

WHAT MADE HIM SUCCESSFUL. 

" The hiding of D wight L. Moody's power lay in five things. 
First, in a definite experience of Christ's saving grace. He had 
passed out of death into life, and he knew it. The new birth was 
to him a subjective certainty. The Spirit witnessed with his 
spirit that he was a son of God. That delivered him from lust 
of earthly things, from deference to the great. The humblest of 
Christians, he yet could conceive of nothing more exalted than 
Divine sonship. Secondly, Mr. Moody believed in the Divine 
authority of the Scriptures. The Bible was to him the voice of 
God, and he made it resound as such in the consciences of men. 
Thirdly, he was baptized with the Holy Spirit and knew that he 
was. It was to him as definite an experience as his conversion, 
and when he preached he expected the Spirit to convert and con- 
vict men. 

"Fourthly, he was a man of prayer. He believed in a living 
and unfettered God. It never occurred to him that the Almighty 
had tied His own hands by natural laws. He believed in the 
supernatural as available. The mountain about him was always 
filled with horses and chariots of fire. But, fifthly, Mr. Moody 
believed in work, in ceaseless effort, in wise provision, in the 
power of organization, of publicity. He expected the supernat- 






FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 141 

ural to work but through the natural. He hitched his wagon 
to a star, but always kept his wheels on the ground and the axles 
well oiled." 

President H. G. Weston, of Crozier Theoligical Seminary, 
followed Dr. Scofield. Iu closing his beautiful tribute to his 
friend, he made the statement deliberately that if Jesus Christ 
had been born in the present century with Mr. Moody's mind and 
body he believed that He would have done just about as Mr. Moody 
did. Dr. Weston said in part: 

HELD MEN WITH HOOKS OF STEEL. 

"I count as one of the greatest blessings of my life my 
acquaintance with Mr. Moody, the influence he has had on me, 
and the privilege of studying God's methods in his life and work. 
We instinctively attribute the success of every man who is emi- 
nent in attaching and influencing others to some special natural 
endowment, to education and training, or to a peculiar magnetic 
personality. Mr. Moody had none of these, yet no man has sur- 
passed him in his power of attraction and influence, both over 
masses of men and over individuals of strong character, of execu- 
tive ability, of great resources, whom he fastened to himself with 
hooks of steel, making them not only his lifelong friends, but his 
constant partners in all his good works. This marvellous power 
wielded so many years undiminished to the end we cannot explain 
by bestowment of any one peculiar, natural gift. He had none of 
them. 

"What had he? He had life. I do not mean the manner of 
living, but what the Bible means by this word — what Christ means 
when He declares the purpose of His coming; I am come that 
they might have life, and might have it abundantly. God gave 
him life, made him a partaker of the Divine nature ; and from 
the moment he received it the development, growth and manifes- 
tation of that life became the whole object of his existence. To it 
he devoted every power of his being, and that devotion kindled 
into intensest activity every latent energy of his nature, and made 
him the complete, round-sided, full-orbed man that he was, of 



142 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

instinctive judgment and tact, and gave him his wonderful mas- 
tery of man. 

"Then he nourished and strengthened that life by devo- 
tion to God's Word. He prized it as the treasure by which his 
life could be enriched. He realized to the full Christ's words: 
'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that pro- 
ceedeth out of the mouth of God.' That word he hid in his heart, 
as the seed is hidden in the earth that it may swell and grow. He 
hid it there, ready for use on every occasion and in every emer- 
gency. It was sweeter to him than honey and the honeycomb. 
His mind and heart were given to the study of the Word of 
God. 

"But his life, like that of Christ's, was for others. He did 
not search the Bible to add to his knowledge, but to save men from 
sin. His first and dominant purpose was to have every man 
receive that life of which he had been made a partaker ; to this 
his sermons were devoted ; he counted everything but loss unless 
this were attained, and then he coveted for all the means of devel- 
oping and utilizing that life. 

SYMPATHY FOR POOR GIRLS AND BOYS. 

"The sight of poor girls and boys deprived of the means of 
education would not let him rest until he had provided some 
method by which their lives should be enriched and made more in 
accordance with heaven's designs in conferring on them spiritual 
life. He dotted this fair plain with houses that young men and 
young women should have the means of so enlarging their lives 
that they might be useful to their fellows. His work was in the 
line of Christ's miracles, which never enriched the object with 
bounties of land or money or resources, but always gave power to 
life, making the dead eye to see, touching the dead tongue, the 
dead ear, the dead limb, and in His highest miracles speaking the 
dead to life. 

"This likeness to Christ, this knowing the power of His 
resurrection and conformity to His death, was the reason that 
when he spoke every man gave him credit for the utmost sincerity. 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 143 

It was the reason that men listened to him and believed him, and 
were influenced by him in the mass and as individuals. They saw 
not the man, bnt the trnth he spoke. He had that wonderful 
egotism by which he conld constantly speak of himself, and yet 
never draw attention to himself. Men saw in all that he was 
and did, the truth as it was in Jesus. I believe that if Jesus 
had been born in this century, and in this town, with Mr. Moody's 
body and mind, he would have lived and done about as Mr. 
Moody did. 

"And so because Mr. Moody could in his measure use those 
great words of Christ, 'I am come that they might have life, and 
that they might have it abundantly,' because these words expressed 
his whole being, I loved and honored and valued him, and because 
of w T hat he was, and, therefore, of what he did, I say to-day, I had 
rather be Mr. Moody dead, lying there in his coffin, than any liv- 
ing man on earth." 

A GLORIOUS TRIUMPH. 

Dr. Torrey made an earnest address, calling upon those present 
and Mr. Moody's friends everywhere to "go forward." In his 
address he said: 

"It is oftentimes the first duty of a pastor to speak words of 
comfort to those whose hearts are aching with loneliness and 
breaking underneath the burden of their sorrow, but this is utterly 
unnecessary to-day. The God of all comfort hath already abun- 
dantly comforted them with a comfort wherewith in coming days 
they will be able to comfort others. I have spent hours within the 
last few days with those who are nearest to our departed friend, 
and the words that I have heard from them have been words 
of rest in God and of triumph. As one of them has said: 'God 
must be answering the prayers that are going up for us all over 
the world, we are being so wonderfully sustained.' Another 
has said: 'His last four glorious hours on earth have taken all 
the sting out of death.' And still another: 'Be sure that every 
word to-day is a word of triumph.' 

"Two thoughts has God laid upon my heart for this hour. 



144 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

The first is found in the words of Paul in I Corinthians xv : 10 : 
'By the grace of God I am what I am.' God has wonderfully 
magnified His grace and love in D. L. Moody. God was magni- 
fied in his birth. The babe that was born sixty-two years ago on 
yonder hill with all the possibilities that were wrapped up in him 
was God's gift to the world. How much that gift meant to the 
world ! How the world has been blessed and benefitted by it we 
shall never know this side the coming of our Lord. God's grace 
was magnified in his conversion. He was born in sin as we are, 
but God by His providence, by the power of His word, by the 
regenerating power of His Holy Spirit, made him the mighty man 
of God that he became. 

STRENGTH AND BEAUTY OF CHARACTER. 

"How much the conversion of that bo} T in Boston forty-three 
years ago meant to the world no man can tell ; but it was all God's 
grace that did it. God's love and grace was magnified again in 
the development of that character that has made him so loved and 
honored in all lands to-day. He had a strength and beauty of 
character possessed by but few sons of men ; but it was all from 
God. To God alone was it due that he differed from other 
men. 

OUR LEADER HAS FALLEN. 

4 'The other thought is found in Joshua, 1:2: 'Moses, my 
servant is dead ; now, therefore, arise, go over this Jordan, thou, 
and all this people, unto the land which I do give to them.' The 
death of Mr. Moody is a call to go forward. A call to his children, 
to his associates, to ministers of the Word everywhere, to the 
whole church. 'Our leader has fallen, let us give up the work,' 
some would say. Not for a minute. Listen to what God says : 
' Your leader is fallen, move forward. Moses, my servant, is dead ; 
therefore arise, go in and possess the land. Be strong and of good 
courage, be not afraid. As I was with D. L. Moody, so I will be 
with thee. I will not fail thee nor forsake thee.' These are the 
admonitions we should heed to-day." 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 145 

Bishop Willard F. Mallalieu, of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church, who had known Mr. Moody since 1875, said that in 
Mr. Moody's death one of the truest, bravest, purest, and most 
influential men of the century had passed to his rest and his 
reward. The Bishop said : 

"Servant of God, well done; 

Thy glorious warfare's past ; 
The battle's fought, the race is won, 
And thou art crowned at last." 

KNEW AND LOVED HIM MANY YEARS. 

" I first met and became acquainted with him whose death we 
mourn, in London in the summer of 1875. From that day, when 
he moved the masses of the world's metropolis, to the hour when 
he answered the call of God to come up higher, I have known him, 
esteemed him, and loved him. Surely we may say, and the world 
will endorse the affirmation, that in his death one of the truest, 
bravest, purest and most influential men of this wonderful nine- 
teenth century has passed to his rest and his reward. With feel- 
ings of unspeakable loss and desolation, we gather about the casket 
that contains all that was mortal of Dwight L. Moody. And yet 
a mighty uplift and inspiration must come to each one of us as we 
think of his character and his achievements, for he was 

" * One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward ; 
Never doubted clouds would break, 
Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph.' 

CONSECRATED HIMSELF TO THE SERVICE OF GOD. 

" In bone and brawn and brain he was a typical New Eng- 
lander ; he was descended from the choicest New England stock ; 
he was born of a New England mother, and from his earliest life 
he breathed the free air of his native hills, and was carefully nur- 
tured in the knowledge of God and the holy traditions and histo- 
ries of the glorious past. It was to be expected of him that he 

would become a Christian of pronounced characteristics, for he 

10 



146 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

consecrated himself thoroughly, completely and irrevocably to 
the service of God and humanity. The heart of no disciple of 
the Master ever beat with more genuine, sympathetic and utterly 
unselfish loyalty than did the great, generous, loving heart of our 
translated friend. 

A MASTER OF THE SAXON TONGUE. 

"Because he held fast to the absolute truth of the Bible, and 
unequivocably and intensely believed it to be the inerrant Word 
of God, because he preached the Gospel rather than talked about 
the Gospel, because he used his mother tongue, the terse, clear, 
ringing, straightforward Saxon ; because he had the profoundest 
sense of brotherhood with all poor, unfortunate and even outcast 
people ; because he was unaffectedly tender and patient with the 
weak and the sinful ; because he hated evil as thoroughly as he 
loved goodness ; because he knew right well how to lead penitent 
souls to the Saviour ; because he had the happy art of arousing 
Christian people to a vivid sense of their obligations, and inciting 
them to the performance of their duties ; because he had in his 
own soul a conscious joyous experience of personal salvation, the 
people flocked to his services, they heard him gladly, they were 
led to Christ, and he came to be prized and honored by all denom- 
inations, so that to-day all Protestanism recognizes the fact that 
he was God's servant, an ambassador of Christ, and indeed a chosen 
vessel to bear the name of Jesus to the nations. 

OUR LOSS IS HIS GAIN. 

" We shall not again behold his manly form animated with 
life, hear his thrilling voice, or be moved by his consecrated per- 
sonality ; but if we are true and faithful to our Lord we shall see 
him in glory, for already he walks the streets of the Heavenly 
city, he mingles in the songs of the innumerable company of 
white-robed saints, sees the King in His beauty, and waits our 
coming. May God grant that in due time we may meet him over 
yonder." Thus closed Bishop Mallalieu's feeling tribute to his 
friend of many years. 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 147 

Dr. Pierson, a friend of long standing, referred to the death 
of four prominent persons in the last few years — C. H. Spurgeon, 
in London ; Adoniram J. Gordon, in Boston ; Catherine Booth, the 
mother of the Salvation Army, and George Mnller, in Bristol — and 
added that Mr. Moody's death was a greater loss than that of any 
of the four mentioned. Mr. Moody was a great man, he said, hav- 
ing the greatness of goodness. Everything that he touched suc- 
ceeded. The speaker estimated that Mr. Moody had addressed 
audiences aggregating one hundred million people during his 
public life. His books have also gone into all the world ; he has 
erected a score of buildings in Europe and America, besides carry- 
ing on for twenty years his great educational institutions. 

HIS HEART'S GREAT DESIRE. 

" I have three children, and the greatest desire of my life is 
that they may be saved," said Mr. Moody in a sermon on "Heaven," 
" that I may know that their names are written in the Book of 
Life. I may be taken from them early ; I may leave them in this 
changing world without a father's care ; but I would rather have 
my children say that of me after I am dead and gone, or if they 
die before me, I would rather they would take that meesage to the 
Master — that ever since they can remember I have tried to lead 
them to the Master, than to have a monument over me reaching 
to the skies." 

William Re veil Moody rose and requested permission to add 
a word. This was his brief tribute of a loyal son to a loving 
father : 

"Asa son I want to say a few words of him as a father. We 
have heard from his pastor, his associates and friends, and he was 
just as true a father. I don't think he showed up in any way bet- 
ter than when, on one or two occasions, in dealing with us as 
children, with his impulsive nature, he spoke rather sharply. In 
every case he would come to us and say : ' My children, my son, 
my daughter, I spoke quickly ; I did wrong ; I want you to for- 
give me.' That was D. L. Moody as a father. 

" He was not yearning to go ; he loved his work. Life was 



148 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

very attractive ; it seems as though on that early morning when 
he had one foot upon the threshold it was given him for our sake 
to give us a word of comfort. He said : ' This is bliss ; it is like 
a trance. If this is death it is beautiful.' And his face lightened 
up as he mentioned those whom he saw. We could not call him 
back ; we tried to for a moment, but we could not. We thank 
God for his home life, for his true life, and we thank God that he 
was our father, and that he led each one of his children to know 
Jesus Christ. Father has crossed the bar ; thank God he was 
homeward bound and went in under full headway." 

John Wanamaker, of Philadelphia, also added a word of testi- 
mony to the memory of his close friend for many years, and then 
the Mt. Hermon Quartet, whose singing was such a treat to Mr. 
Moody, sang, " The Hope of the Coming of the Lord," a new 
hymn by Major Whittle, to which his daughter, Mrs. Moody, 
wrote the music : 

A lamp in the night, a song in time of sorrow, 
A great glad hope which faith can never borrow, 
To glide the passing day with the glory of the morrow 
Is the hope of the coming of the Lord. 

Chorus. 

Blessed hope, blessed hope, 

Blessed hope of the coming of the Lord, 

How the aching heart it cheers, 

How it glistens thro' our tears, 

Blessed hope of the coming of the Lord. 

A star in the sky, a beacon bright to guide us, 
An anchor sure, to hold when storms betide us, 
A refuge for the soul where in quiet we may hide us, 
Is the hope of the coming of the Lord 

A word from the One to all our hearts the dearest, 

A parting word to make Him, aye, the nearest, 

Of all his precious words, the sweetest, brightest, clearest, 

Is the hope of the coming of the Lord. 

After the public services the coffin was carried again by the 
Mount Hermon students to Round Top, the Olivet of Northneld, 
just at the crown of the little hill, where many of the best meet- 
ings are held every year. Mr. Moody thought that the Lord 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 149 

might return while he was living, and he had been hea^d to say- 
that there was no place on earth that he would prefer to be when 
that eventful hour dawned than on Round Top. His remark was 
recalled after his death, and no other place was even mentioned. 
At the grave those gathered sang, "Jesus Lover of My Soul," Dr. 
Torrey offered prayer and Dr. Scofield pronounced the benediction. 
After the friends had withdrawn, the family gathered about 
the coffin, the cover was raised, and a last look was taken of the 
face of the husband and father. The cover was replaced, and the 
coffin with its precious burden was lowered into the box resting in 
the simple brick vault. From this resting place one may see his 
birthplace, a little more than a stone's throw to the south ; his own 
home for the last quarter of a century, about as far to the west ; 
the seminary buildings, some of them a minute's walk to the 
north ; the last two buildings erected at Mount Hermon, the 
chapel and Overton Hall, four miles distant, appear across the 
beautiful Connecticut River Valley. To the north six miles, 
Hinsdale, in New Hampshire, is plainly seen, while the hills 
about Brattleboro stand out in bold relief. 

THE SCHOOLS MUST BE SUSTAINED. 

At a meeting of Mr. Moody's friends held in the evening after 
the funeral, it was decided to make a public statement regarding 
the institutions founded by him. These consist of the Northfield 
Seminary and the Northfield Training School for Young Women, 
the Mount Hermon School for Young Men, and the Bible Insti- 
tute at Chicago, for both men and women. The Northfield plant 
consists of 1,200 acres of land and thirty buildings. With its 
present endowment it is valued at $1,250,000 and is practically 
free from debt. At Chicago the buildings, land and endowment 
exceed $250,000 in value. The Northfield schools have about 900 
students, who are charged $100 a year for board and tuition ; the 
actual cost is $200. At Chicago the amount required approximates 
$150 each for 300 students. 

In other words $125,000 annually is required to maintain the 
work begun by Mr. Moody of offering young men and women of 



150 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

limited means an opportunity to secure an education that will 
thoroughly equip them for Christian life and service. This sum 
was largely raised by Mr. Moody's personal efforts. It was pro- 
posed to start a Moody Memorial Endowment Fund of $3,000,000, 
which would guarantee the perpetuation of his work. 

He needs no wreath or marble' s sheen 
To keep his blessed memory green : 
In hearts that love and trust 'twill bide 
Until time' s latest eventide. 

A LIFE FITLEY ENDED. 

The following appreciative tribute is from the well-known 
religious journal, "The Ram's Horn": 

"A giant oak has fallen. And yet, though the death of 
Dwight L. Moody came as a shock to two hemispheres, nobody 
could say that it was a catastrophe. No lightning bolt, expressive 
of God's wrath at a mis-spent career, shattered that great tree. No 
vice ate the marrow and brought its life to an untimely or unex- 
pected end. Mr. Moody's illness was brief, and his death was 
natural. It was a fitting termination to a life of wonderful activity 
and of infinite consequences for good. While he was living, some 
men and some papers tried to make light of his homely speech, 
robust figure and simple creed, but now that he is dead, it is sur- 
prising to note how the whole race of men haste to ' do him rever- 
ence.' No ruler, statesman, scholar or philanthropist who has 
ever lived, has had more wreaths of praise placed on his bier. 

"If Mr. Moody has been susceptible to worldly admiration, 
the encomiums which his death has evoked, must have been pleas- 
ing to him as he passed to the glories of the great beyond. But 
we have never heard of a public character who cared so little 
for the praise or blame of men. He sought only to be a workman 
approved in the sight of God, and as he passed into glory, he did 
not pause to catch the shout of admiring men, but he must have \ 
listened, rather, to hear the ( Well done' of the Master. 

"In Mr. Moody, God proved once more how He can take the 
weak and foolish things of this world to confound the mighty. If 
a committee of one hundred Christian leaders had been appointed 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. lol 

forty years ago to search the whole world and select a young man 
who had the best material to qualify him for a great evangelist's 
career, we presume Dwight Moody would have been about the last 
boy whom they would have chosen. Clumsy, awkward, bashful, 
untaught, unimaginative, unemotional, lacking in every gift but 
one for the making of a great man, a great leader, and especially 
of a great evangelist. But that one gift was worth a whole armory 
when used in the service of God. 

ZEAL OF THE RIGHT KIND. 

" He had zeal. But his zeal was not that which spends itself, 
like a foaming tide, in frenzied and fruitless assault. Such is 
'zeal not according to knowledge.' His force was directed, rather, 
like that column of water which is used in hydraulic mining. 
Away above, and miles beyond the spot where it is driven against 
the mountain's side, are the reservoirs. Their mighty pressure is 
what gives power to the stream. The man who holds the nozzle 
is an important agent, for it is he who by skill and experience 
directs the force, beneath which rock and earth dissolve like quick- 
sand. Mr. Moody put himself in connection with God's immense 
reservoir of love. He learned that love has more dynamic energy 
than a universe of water, and God used his well-directed zeal to 
carry the message of love to the overthrowing of pride, formalism, 
and cold conceit, and to the annihilation of the ranker wickedness 
of the world at large. 

" He turned the spiritual stream of Gospel love first against 
this great city. The walls of trade tumbled, and upon their ruins 
arose a plain tabernacle which was thronged by more thousands 
than poured into the temple at Jerusalem in a lifetime. He turned 
the stream of love against the granite walls of Britain, where 
ecclesiasticism had beeai anchored secure for centuries. The walls 
tottered and fell, and out of their wreckage came Drummond and 
Stalker and Meyer, and a thousand others who rebuilt the citadel 
of faith and founded it upon the broader base of consecrated 
culture. 

" Mr. Moody next directed the stream of God's love against his 



152 FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 

own Nazareth, where a prophet, native born, might have expected 

no honor. Against intellectual New England, which is studded 

with colleges, but which had not given young Moody even a course 

in grammar, the unlettered evangelist turned the stream of his 

fervor. 

ADDRESS AT HARVARD UNIVERSITY. 

" I heard him once address a thousand students gathered 
from all New England in the assembly hall at Harvard. His 
speech was still uncouth. No honeyed periods, such as were 
familiar to that classic presence, flowed from his lips. It might 
have been hard to parse his words or phrase his sentences, but we 
all knew what he meant. And there were no suppressed ripples 
of laughter in that audience ; there was many a tear. In New 
England he paid his tribute to culture by erecting, at Northfield, 
two colleges — one for men and one for women — and in return New 
England, together with the whole world which had come under 
his influence, pays him tribute by leading a life of higher spirit- 
uality and sacrifice. His career is a colossal proof that God is a 
reality ; that the Cross of Christ is the most potent fulcrum in 
the universe for the uplift of humanity and the overthrow of hell. 
What God has done through Dwight L. Moody He stands ready, 
anxious to do through every similar man who invokes His power 
and who is worthy to use it." 

Rev. I. C. Scofield, Mr. Moody's pastor, at Northfield, said, 
concerning him : 

" Great as will be the universal sense of loss in the death of 
Dwight L. Moody, it is here in Northfield that he will be most 
acutely missed, most deeply mourned. It is not only that he 
was the founder of the noble institutions which remain to be his 
worthy monument and the pride of our village, nor even that his 
energy gathered here the great summer conventions which gave 
Northfield so wide a fame, but it is rather that his impressive 
personality filled and pervaded our Northfield life. Nowhere else 
was Mr. Moody so thoroughly understood as in Northfield. The 
elderly part of our people grew up with him, went to school with 
him, played and worked with him. They are full of remini- 



FUNERAL SERVICES OF MR. MOODY. 153 

scences of his boyhood, and the testimony abounds that from his 
earliest years he was the same powerful spirit whom the world 
came to know as the greatest modern master of assemblies. ' He 
was always a leader/ said Deacon Edward Barber, his sometime 
playmate and lifelong personal friend. 

"Mr. Moody was a hill town New Englander to the backbone. 
Wherever he went and however he might be surrounded by the 
great of the earth, he never lost that self poise and that whole- 
some common sense which are so characteristic of the old hill 
town stock. He never saw a landscape so fair that it seemed to 
him as lovely as Northfield. He was racy of the soil. 

AMAZING CAPACITY FOR WORK. 

"It was amusing to see Mr. Moody in the act of what he called 
resting. After months of exhausting toil in great meetings he 
would return to Northfield to 'rest.' And this was the manner of 
it : When at home he always rose at five in the morning, went to 
the kitchen for a cup of coffee and then called for his buggy. By 
six he would be among the milkers at Mount Hermon, or in the 
kitchen where the breakfast of his students was preparing. If 
any especial work was afoot, he was sure to look it over, master 
every detail of it and give shrewd, practical suggestions. At eight 
he was back in Northfield breakfasting with his family. For weeks 
together he would address the young ladies of the Seminary at 
nine, then look over his huge mail, and finish the forenoon by 
driving again to Mount Hermon to speak to the boys at eleven. 

"What his labors were during the great conventions, how 
shrewd, tactful and masterful he was, everybody knows. We knew 
that he was wearing himself out, but he smiled benignantly at our 
warnings and went right on. Doubtless Dwight L. Moody was 
one of those primitive and elemental men, built on so great a scale 
that of right the whole world owned him, but we of Northfield 
knew him as the world never did and mourn him as the world 
never can," 



CHAPTER IX. 

Memorial Services in Honor of Mr. Moody. 

AT a great meeting held in the Temple, Philadelphia, Rev. 
Rnssell H. Conwell, pastor, Bishop Cyrus D. Foss, of the 
Methodist Episcopal Church, took the chair, and after devotional 
exercises, spoke as follows : 

We are not gathered here to-night to sound the praise of a 
hero nor to swell his fame. God and the angels will take care of 
that; for if there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth 
what a welcome must our good friend have had, who preached the 
Gospel, no doubt, to many millions of men, and was God's agent 
in leading scores of thousands to the foot of the cross. What an 
outburst of angelic and saintly song, and what symphony of golden 
harps there must have been in heaven when he arrived ! We are 
here for our own sake ; we are here not for his, but to gather inspi- 
ration from the thought of what, by God's grace and by God's 
natural gifts to him, he was and is. i\nd surely it is well for 
Christians of many names, without regard to their churchly lines 
at all, to gather here to make mention of this beloved friend, this 
wonderful man, who belonged to all the churches — nay, was the 
common property of Christendom on both sides of the Atlantic. 

And what was he? Others will say a few words in answer to 
that question to-night ; my words must be very few in opening the 
meeting. I wish I could say four things in four minutes which 
are in my mind and heart to say. To begin with, he was a great 
pattern, of a man. When God has great work to do he prepares 
special instruments. And sometimes His pattern men, who do the 
most, have faults — I suppose all men have them — but their faults 
are only made more conspicuous b}^ their greatness. Luther had 
his, William the Silent had his, and Cromwell had his. Possibly 
our friend had his — I don't know them — but God made him on a 
large pattern, gave him a great nature ; and I have to believe that 
154 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 155 

he who doubtless did preach the Gospel to more men than any 
other man who ever lived (I challenge yonr attention to that propo- 
sition ; I believe it is correct), could have done any one of twenty 
other great things. If it had fallen to his lot, and his training had 
prepared him for it, he might have been a great general, like Wel- 
lington or Grant ; he might have been a greatlSpeaker of the House 
of Representatives. Any one of twenty great things were possi- 
ble for him to do if God's provisions had led him to them. 

A THOROUGHLY CONSECRATED MAN. 

Another thing I thoroughly believe about him is that he was 
a man of rare consecration. Alas, that so many professing Chris- 
tians fritter their lives away in asking whether they shall do their 
duty. That question never seemed to come to him after his con- 
version, as it did not to St. Paul. Once for all he answered the 
question, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do," and having 
settled that, the question simply was, what is duty ? And to that 
this good man seemed to me ever to spring with relish and glad- 
ness, never to waste his time in asking whether or not a duty 
should be done. From that blundering and illiterate boyhood of 
his, when as an attendant of Dr. Kirk's church in Boston, having 
found his way to the foot of the cross, he could not tell enough 
about it to be admitted for a year into the church ; from that 
beginning of the great work in the slums of Chicago — so awk- 
wardly done at first — all the way along, he showed the spirit of a 
supreme consecration to God and to duty and to Jesus Christ and 
to the work of evangelism. I doubt, if you could have waked him 
up at midnight, after his most wearisome labors, when utterly 
exhausted, and have asked him to lead a sinner to Jesus, but that 
there would have flashed from his eyes, before he could have fairly 
got them open, a light that would have brought the sinner to the 
foot of the cross. He was, from head to foot and in every fibre of l 
his nature, consecrated to God, as I think, and to the great work 
of evangelism to which God had called him. 

He was also a man of one book. That was a great thing 
about him. He loved the Bible ; he believed the Bible ; he knew 



156 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

the Bible as very few men ever come tcx know it ; and used it, and 
used it trustfully, as our Lord used the book ; and never seemed 
to once ask himself the question whether Moses wrote the whole 
of the Pentateuch or not. I say Moody used the Bible, as Jesus 
did, trustfully. And it answered the purpose very thoroughly. 

One word more, and I give way to others. He was gifted by 
God with a rare power of generalship. His body was a strong, 
massive body ; his eye a keen, flashing eye ; his will a great, 
commanding will. And you remember how he raised that arm 
when it would seem almost like the sword of a General ; when his 
voice sounded like a bugle call ; and when his strong common 
sense was put to the work of managing a great audience of six or 
seven thousand people. It was a grand phenomenon to any student 
of human nature. In doing his great work he commanded the 
ready acquiescence of all sorts of people. All the way up and 
down the gamut of human nature he was master of the scale. He 
was the great leader of evangelism in our time. 

But he has passed on to everlasting glory. I hail him there : 

Servant of God — well done, 

Thy glorious warfare past, 
The battle fought, the victory won, 

And thou art crowned at last. 

MR. WANAMAKER'S GLOWING TRIBUTE. 
I want to say many things more, but I yield to others. I 
understand that the Order of Exercises calls next for remarks from 
the Hon. John Wanamaker. 

Hon. John Wanamaker responded as follows : 
Mr. Chairman, I should be the last on the programme, instead 
of the first. This is a stormy night to stand about a grave ; it 
would seem as if all the tears of the country had come into Phila- 
delphia as a fit setting for the memorial service. I hardly know 
how best to speak to-night or try to speak. There are three chap- 
ters of my thoughts — I cannot utter them all — the first the remin- 
iscences that go back to my boyhood, when Mr. Moody was just 
rising into his young manhood and I met him first ; then the story 
of the two hours after the funeral ceremony at Northfield ; then. 




1° 

> III 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 157 

chapter three, the lessons of such a life. To take one, perhaps 
it would be better, seeing that the newspapers are full of the inci- 
dents that for years to come will be fresh to the American people, 
of his great life that was a life indeed. There doesn't seem to 
have ever been a part of him that was half asleep. If there was 
anything that Mr. Moody loved it was life. And he was the 
embodiment of it physically, mentally, and spiritually. So that 
perhaps it might interest you the most to have a little quiet visit 
for a few minutes, to the humble home where he laid him down 
in the chamber of peace, and, with his face toward the sunrise, 
fell asleep. 

A VERY IMPRESSIVE SCENE. 

No one who came to Northfield at any time could go away 
without a deep impression of its sweet quiet, as though the touch 
of an inspired life was over all the hills ; but how much more 
impressive to come there on a day when business of every kind 
had stopped and the people, with mournful faces — those that could 
not enter the church — stood in knots about the village and on the 
roadside ; and the large church, not large enough to contain per- 
haps the students, had by their gracious courtesy been given over 
to the people who had come from far and near to sit close to the 
man who had fallen asleep. It would be impossible to convey to 
any one's mind a full impression of that afternoon — the service 
beginning really at half past ten in the morning, when the form 
of the old friend was looked upon for the last time, and the people 
came and went all day, until 2.30, when the service began. To 
attempt to tie half a dozen threads out of those eloquent tributes 
that were spoken would be almost an impossibility ; you 
must get them when they come to print the little volume that will 
give in full all the the loving, true words that were spoken. I am 
simply trying to give you an impression of the occasion. I can 
never forget the influence of that hour upon not one or two 
devoted friends of this beloved man, but upon all the people. As 
he lay there, lifted up above the little bed upon which they had 
laid him, it seemed as though he was still living. 

Indeed, we well remembered his words — some of us who heard 



158 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

him on his last visit to Philadelphia — when he said: "They will 
tell yon that D. L. Moody is dead, bnt don't believe it; he will 
always be living; he will always be aronnd." One conld hardly 
believe that he was other than sleeping ; there was the same fine 
color, not a wrinkle npon his face, and it seemed as thongh the 
same sway that he had over great audiences, when he stood before 
them, still went out from him as he lay there in the presence of 
the people. After the precious words were spoken and twilight 
had almost fallen npon the scene, the funeral procession proceeded 
to the outside of the building, where they were met by the thirty- 
two students from Mount Hermon. The casket was carried to the 
bier along a platform covered with flowers ; and these young fel- 
lows, sixteen on each side, bore the body along silently, followed 
by a long procession of sobbing people, to Round Top, the place he 
loved so much. 

A BETTER WORLD TO COME. 

Oh ! how he loved this earth. He used to say so often, " The 
earth is a good place. I have had a very good time, but I have a 
great deal better time ahead." It was peculiarly interesting to 
note how very fond he was of home. He would often say, in the 
autumn days, " I must hurry home ; I want to see the brown earth 
before the snow covers the leaves." So it was on his last visit to 
Philadelphia. After the meeting in Witherspoon Hall, where he 
took part in the evangelistic services, he hurried away on his visit 
to the schools, coming back to the city in the early part of Novem- 
ber. Some of his friends wanted him to stay in the city in the late 
autumn ; but he must go off to the West to visit the churches, 
stopping in Philadelphia on his way to utter the great desire that 
filled his heart, to say to friends, " I would like, before I die, to be 
used of God to move one great sinner." What was it Elijah said? 
" I must go to Gilgal and then to Jericho, and then beyond the 
Jordan." 

I went home the night he was in the city after the talk at the 
Philadelphia meeting, and I said to some friends at my house, 
" Mr. Moody to-night seemed more pathetic than I ever knew him 






MEMORIAL SERVICES. 150 

to be. In his concern about a revival of religion in Philadelphia, 
he seemed to me, in his vehement earnestness, like the prophet 
Elijah." It was his desire that it might be arranged for him to 
come and spend a winter in this city, in the hope of another great 
blessing. 

EASY TO GO EXCEPT FOR FRIENDS. 

Well, dear friends, just a few moments more, as I see there 
are so many others to speak. When the time came for parting 
with the little family that had been kneeling by the grave, there 
were words said that led me to stay into the night and until the 
next morning. Betraying nothing of what was said, but what 
will be to you a memory of your old friend, and also an encour- 
agement in the triumph of a life so faithful, I will repeat to you 
j ust a few words that came from the lips of the woman who helped 
to make this man's life so brave — Mrs. Moody herself. She, her 
boys, and the one girl sat around the family hearth and told the 
story of those last hours, of how the father said again and again, 
"It is easy to go away, but for you, but for you, seeing that there 
is no dark valley there." There is something very consoling in 
that thought. So many people wonder whether we shall know 
those who have gone on. And this dear man was permitted to see 
the children and the grandchildren, and to come back to them. I 
can see the radiant face of dear Mrs. Moody, as she asked, "Don't 
you think that God gave him that blessing that he might return ;" 
and Will, speaking up, said, "Father certainly died three times — 
he came back twice to tell us that it wasn't hard to die." 

Dear friends, God does not forget those who have trusted him ; 
and of all the great things about the lives of the men of whom 
the good Bishop has spoken to-night, is there anything to compare 
to what has been vouchsafed to this great old soldier of the 
Imperial Guard of the Master, from first to last, in his life battle 
for this great Captain? I want you to take from me the picture 
of that little simple home, filled with brightness because of the 
faith of that family bereft, and because of what they have been 
permitted to see in the sunset of that glorious life which we are 
contemplating to-night. 



160 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

Referring again to the scene of which I have spoken (and 
with this I close, thongh like the bishop having said bnt little of 
what is in iny heart to say), my mind has reverted to it so often 
that I have gone along in thought, day after day, up the Round 
Top, where we left him. In that old cathedral in Venice, behind 
the great altar, are the alabaster columns, stained with age and, 
in the dull shadows, seemingly unworthy of special notice ; but 
when some hand from behind them applies the lighted taper, they 
shine like crystals, in gorgeous colors, vieing in splendor with the 
light of the morning or the brilliant sunset hues that come in the 
evening time. Mr. Moody was like a great alabaster column, 
perhaps unattractive in itself, but by the power of an unseen hand 
made so brilliant and imposing that we stand in wonder upon 
beholding it. Would that we had known that George Whitefield 
was living again, that we had another John Wesley. In many 
respects he was like Wesley in his simplicity, in his wonderful 
common sense, and in his magnificent power of attention to 
details. He would have been, in my judgment, one of the most 
superb business men, if it had been the providence of God to lead 
him into business. Little had we thought until we looked up into 
his face, that we were in the presence of the majesty of so great a 
character. Some one has said that we shall never see the like of 
him again. 

WILL NEVER SEE ANOTHER MOODY. 

Speaking from a human standpoint, it would be as impossible 
to replace D. L. Moody as it would be to replace Abraham Lin- 
coln. Those two men, as Dr. Cuyler said on Monday, will stand 
before the American people — aye, before the whole world — as two 
of the greatest characters of the century. None of us can lay 
to-night, at his feet, a tribute that is commensurate with our 
desires or our efforts, because he was so great a blessing to every 
one who had the privilege of knowing him. 

Rev. Wm. C. Webb, D. D., the Secretary of the Evangelical 
Alliance, under whose auspices the meeting was held, here read a 
few of many letters that had been received. These were from 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 101 

Rev. Drs. Charles Wood and Henry C. McCook, Bishop Whit- 
aker, Mr. Lewis H. Redner, and Rev. Rnssell H. Conwell. The 
latter wrote as follows : 

"Will yon kindly express to the gathering called by The 
Alliance to show respect for the memory of D. L. Moody my sin- 
cere regret that an engagement, made before Mr. Moody's death, 
in a distant city, compels me to be absent ? Will yon also kindly 
say that it wonld be for me a sweet privilege to share with any 
gathering of brethren assembled for so sacred a pnrpose as to show 
reverence for the character, respect for the work, and appreciation 
of the friendship of snch a saintly man? The power of God rested 
npon him. His work will go on through time and eternity." 

ADDRESS BY MR. SANKEY. 

Mr. Ira D. Sankey, the co-laborer of Mr. Moody for so many 
years, was called upon, and responded as follows : 

I have just come from a large gathering of the trustees of 
the schools at Northfield and the Bible Institute at Chicago. We 
met to-day, in New York City, to lay plans for raising a memorial 
fund to carry on Mr. Moody's work. This is one of the most 
important things that is now pressing upon the hearts of the 
trustees of those institutions. A large and influential committee 
was appointed by the trustees, embracing some of the most promi- 
nent names in the financial world, in all the larger cities of the 
country. I presume that by to-morrow the press of the country 
will have a report of that meeting. It commenced at ten o'clock, 
and it was still in session when I had to leave for your city. I 
trust and hope, and believe as well, that the action of the trustees 
to-day will lead to the raising of a large memorial fund, sufficient 
for carrying on the three different schools which Mr. Moody 
founded — the Northfield Seminary, the Mount Hermon Boys' 
School and the Bible Institute in Chicago. These institutions 
lay very near Mr. Moody's heart, as you all know, and have heard 
to-night. 

Before singing a hymn which was one of Mr. Moody's favor- 
ites, I would like to j ust say a word or two in regard to the schools 
• 11 



162 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

at Northfield, so that, when a call is niade upon the citizens of 
Philadelphia and the country at large, they may "be the better pre- 
pared to act, by being informed in regard to what the schools are, 
what they stand for, and how they originated. 

After our return from the old country and while he was 
speaking for a few months at home, Mr. Moody was seen to drive 
away, one summer day in his buggy (the little one-horse carriage 
in which he drove around the country) to one of the mountains 
back of his home. It seems that, after arriving near the top of 
the mountain, he came across a little farmhouse with a very few 
acres of land, and all about the place the indications of poverty, as 
everywhere else on that barren mountain. He found there a 
family whom he had known when, as a boy, he used to climb 
about the mountains near his home. He hitched his horse to the 
fence and went in to greet his old friends. 

ORIGIN OF NORTHFIELD SEMINARY. 

He found the father lying upon a bed of sickness, and, in 
another part of the building, the mother also suffering with a very 
serious illness. Upon greeting them he sat down and talked a 
little while, after which the two daughters of the old people came 
into the room, carrying a large bundle of willows that they had 
gathered in the valley of the Connecticut. They sat down and 
began the operation of making little willow baskets. Mr. Moody, 
becoming interested in the work of the two young women, said to 
them, " What is your object in life — what are you going to do?" 
" Well," they replied, " Mr. Moody, we would like to get an educa- 
tion, if we could ; we have had a common school education, but if 
we could get a higher education we would possibly be able, as 
teachers, to earn money to support our parents, who are so poor. 
As it is now, Mr. Moody, our time is all taken up, as you see, in 
this work, from which we earn only enough to keep the family 
together." 

Mr. Moody, after reflecting a few moments, said: "Let us 
pray." And kneeling down beside that poor old father, leaning 
his arm upon the bedside, he prayed that God might open a way 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 163 

by which that family would he helped. After the prayer he bade 
them " goodbye," went out, got in his buggy, and started down the 
mountain. 

One day, some months after that, he told me of the incident, 
and said: " Mr. Sankey, before I reached the foot of the mountain 
God had made it very clear to me what I should do to help these 
two 3 r oung women, and all young women in New England similarly 
situated, who have character and ability, but no money with which to 
get an education." By the time he reached his home, the matter of 
forming a school for such girls was fully evolved in his mind, and 
he immediately went to work to carry out his scheme. Not long 
after that he gathered a lot of his friends together. I remember very 
well the day when in the streets of Northfield, under the beautiful 
elm trees, the foundation of the building in connection with the 
school life was laid. Mr. Durant, whom many of you remember, 
the great lawyer of Boston, the founder of Wellesley College, was 
there. Mr. Moody having made his home in that gentleman's 
house during our campaign in Boston in 1876, Mr. Durant came 
up to help Mr. Moody lay the cornerstone of this building. 

HIS FATHER'S OLD TROWEL. 

A little incident occurred in connection with that cornerstone 
laying which moved the hearts of all present, and I will tell you 
of it. After Mr. Durant and others ' had spoken, it became the 
duty of Mr. Moody to lay the cornerstone. He got up on the 
platform, made a little address, and, holding up before the audience 
a beautiful silver trowel with some writing on it, said: " My 
friends have secured this beautiful trowel with which to lay the 
stone ; it is rather too beautiful for my use on this occasion." 
Looking over his shoulder towards a house not far distant, he 
added, "Yesterday I went up to my mother's house and up into 
the old garret, where I used to ramble about as a boy, and there I 
found this trowel." Holding up the instrument in his hand, he 
said: " This is my father's trowel ; he used to earn the bread for 
the family with this ; it is a little worn and a little rusty, but it is 
quite good enough for me to lay this cornerstone with." 



161 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 



Then lie went on and laid the stone with the old trowel that 
his father had nsed fort}' years before. God blessed the laying of 
that stone, and to-day there is, I suppose, a million dollars' worth 
of property on those hills, and buildings have followed, one after 
the other, as an offering for the education of young women and 
young men who have character and ability, but no money. And 
I want you, friends in Philadelphia, to know that the school is not 
like other schools in this particular. It is to help the girl or the 
boy who would never get an education in any other way. It is 
not in competition with any other school whatever, but it is to help 
those who need help, and who will appreciate the help they receive. 
I think you will agree that a school of that kind ought to be 
encouraged and sustained by the good people of this country ; and 
I have abundant faith that it will be. 

APPEAL FOR THE MOODY SCHOOLS. 

Now, I will not take further time, but will sing the hymn that 
Mr. Moody has made, for me, almost sacred and immortal, by say- 
ing, as he was going through the gates, " There'll be no dark 
valley ;" and I will ask the choir, and the whole congregation as 
well, to j oin in the chorus of that hymn. 

(Mr. Sankey here led in singing the hymn, the old Moody 
and Sankey choir joining in the chorus.) 

Mr. Sankey, upon the invitation of Dr. Webb, the secretary, 
made a brief appeal in aid of the offering for the Moody school, 
which the audience was about to make. He said : 

I will not detain you but a single moment to say that I agree 
with my brother that the thing that is now needed is for us all to 
take up and sustain the work at Northfield. And I hope that, 
after a little, a great movement for a dollar subscription will be 
organized, by which the common people who loved Mr. Moody 
will have an opportunity to contribute, even such small gifts, to 
this great fund. I will say to those who feel at liberty to-night 
to help in the work that is going on there that there are about 
eight hundred young people there ; and the expenses, including 
board and tuition, cannot be met by the $100 paid by them indi- 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 165 

vidually. Another $100 will have to be raised for each scholar 
there during the year. So that the money that you are kind 
enough to give will go toward carrying on the work there at 
Northfield. God bless every dollar that is given. Let me add 
that this committee that has been formed in New York will be a 
guaranty to everybody in the United States who cares to con- 
tribute, that the money will be in strong hands and will be placed 
in such an investment as will make it secure for all the years to 
come. 

A LAST TALK WITH MOODY. 

Rev. Wayland Hoyt, D. D., upon being introduced, spoke as 
follows: Ma}^ I try to tell you, in just a moment, of the last talk 
I had with Mr. Moody, and some of the lessons which it taught 
me? This talk of mine with him was but a few weeks before he 
died and only a few days before the last great meeting he held in 
Kansas City. If I had thought of it as a last talk, I should have 
treasured it more, but it is our wont, you know, not to treasure 
sufficiently the most valuable things at the moment they occur. I 
was making my way to Windsor, Vermont, to address a Christian 
Endeavor Convention when, in the depot at Springfield, Mass., I 
met Mr. Moody, and there our talk began, and was continued for 
awhile in the train. The lesson I gathered from it was that }f 
tireles^ness in the Master's service. He had been telling me how 
he had j ust come from a two weeks' day and night campaign in 
New York and Brooklyn ; and instead of saying anything about 
resting, he was all the time anxious to plunge, in the quickest 
way, into further service. I did not ask him the question in words, 
but I did in thought, "Do you never rest?" 

It seems to me that Mr. Moody stands before us as a splendid 
example of noble tirelessness for the Lord. Does he not come 
close to our ideal of the strenuous urgency of the Great Master, 
who said "I must do the will of Him that sent me, while it is 
day?" There was the church he joined in Chicago; the four 
pews in it that he hired, though he was but a poor clerk in a shoe 
store, which pews he steadily kept full of young men ; that Sun- 
day-school established in the slums of Chicago, out of which came 



166 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

the Tabernacle ; the quick building of the Tabernacle after the 
Chicago fire, in the heart of the desolated district, though his own 
house had gone up in flames ; that fervent and persistent speech 
of his to men and women, concerning Jesus Christ, as he met them 
along the ways of the daily life ; that quick seizure of new methods 
for the service of his Lord, like that first Christian Convention in 
Boston ; the great meetings that then naturally began to gather 
around him, on both sides of the Atlantic, through which he urged 
his way so splendidly and effectively ; the schools in Northfield and 
in Chicago ; the summer meetings in Northfield ; and finally, 
that great meeting in Kansas City, when the restless soldier was 
smitten. 

Does there not come to all of us, from such a life as that of 
Mr. Moody's, as a kind of bugle note — tirelessness for Jesus Christ? 
I would that we might all of us hear that note ; I would that we 
might, all of us, catch at least a little of that inspiration ; I would 
that that infectious enthusiasm were more thoroughly distributed. 
If it were, nothing could withstand the Church of Jesus Christ ; 
if it were, the land would be glorious with revivals ; if it were, the 
millenium would not be distant. 

REPUTATION A HINDRANCE. 

Another lesson that I gathered from that last talk with Mr. 
Moody, was as to the right place to put emphasis. I never shall 
forget a remark he made. He had been telling me of a difficulty 
which had specially confronted him in these later years. He 
referred to the great crowding to his meetings of confessedly Chris- 
tian people, and this preventing his having access to the non- 
church goers, to those who did not spiritually know the Lord. 
That was the difficulty. His remark was this, "My reputation is 
my hindrance." It seemed to me very significant of the beautiful 
self-sacrifice and humility of Mr. Moody, and at the same time a 
revelation of where Christians ought to put emphasis. I am sure 
that Mr. Moody valued his own reputation as every true man does ; 
but his first thought was not of himself ; his first thought was of 
the work of Jesus Christ; and I am very sure that Mr. Moody 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 1G7 

would quickly aud gladly have surrendered his great and well- 
earned reputation if by doing so he could have won souls to Jesus 
Christ. 

Would that that spirit were more universal, that we had less 
thought of ourselves and more outspoken loyalty to Jesus Christ 
and his cause. Dr. Trumbull tells you that, in the earlier years, 
in Chicago, somebody who was not much of a worker but was a 
good deal of a critic (and the good critics are not the best workers 
generally) said to Mr. Moody, " Moody, you ought never to speak 
in public, you make mistakes in grammar." Mr. Moody replied, 
" I know I make many mistakes and I lack many qualifications ; 
but, my friend, you have lots of grammar — what are you doing 
with it for Jesus ? " 

THE WORLD FLOODED WITH ISMS. 

One other lesson that I learned from this last talk I had with 
Mr. Moody was his inflexible faith in Jesus Christ as the only 
Help and Saviour af the world. He said to me, " Did you ever 
hear of so many isms as are going now — socialism, spiritualism, 
Christian Scienceism ; but there is no ism for the Master." He 
was as hungry to preach Jesus Christ as he was in the first days 
of his great career. He was only anxious to know how and where 
he could preach Him best. And, as he departed from the train to 
tell the girls in Mt. Holyoke Seminary, that afternoon, of Jesus, 
he left in me a more yearning purpose to devote myself with 
freshened strength to this one thing of telling about Jesus Christ, 
the world's only hope and only help. May that be your purpose 
and continue to be mine : and as we gather inspiration from the 
great example and vast success of our gifted brother, let us see to 
it that, more earnestly than ever, wherever we can, we contribute 
our measure of effort and achievement to the cause of Jesus Christ. 
Mr. Wanamaker has said "They buried him on Mount Herraon." 
That may be true of his body ; it is not true of his spirit. That 
is with the Lord in Paradise. May we at last, every one of us, 
through our Saviour, be admitted to that presence ! 

Rev. S. W. Dana, the next speaker, said that a conspicuous 



168 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

characteristic of Mr. Moody was trie fervor and persistence with, 
which he labored to the end for the attainment of a high and 
undivided purpose. Unlike the minister who preaches the same 
old series of sermons in different places, until they have lost their 
originality and become stereotyped, not only were his addresses 
fresh and vigorous, but he knew nothing of what is called " the 
dead line of fifty/' He was just as enthusiastic and fervent after 
passing that line as he had been before ; and the last decade of his 
life was the most fruitful and serviceable of his career. 

Another lesson taught by his life was that he consecrated to 
God what he had. Unlike those who waste their lives in wishing 
they were something else than they are, he utilized to the fullest 
the talents God had given him. Without a liberal education, he 
was a close student of English and acquired a style of orator}' that 
was the most direct and forceable of any since Bunyan's, also a 
power of holding an audience and of expressing great truths with 
wonderful clearness and force. 

COULD ADAPT HIMSELF TO NEW CONDITIONS. 

His faculty of adapting himself to new conditions was shown 
in the results of his conferences with students from all parts of 
the world and in the establishment of his schools. His sterling 
character and the fact that he kept his name untarnished deserve 
special emphasis. He did not live for fame or money and was 
ambitious only for spiritual results. 

An interesting feature of the service was the singing of Mr. 
Moody's favorite hymns by Mr. Sankey, in which the choir and 
audience joined. 

Two thousand persons attended the Dwight E. Mood}' memo- 
rial meeting in Tremont Temple, Boston, where prominent pastors 
and laymen of many denominations crowded the platform, and for 
over two hours extolled the life and work of the great evangelist. 
The meeting was held under the auspices of the Evangelistic 
Association of Xew England. Henry M. Moore, of Boston, who 
for nearh- thirty years had been associated with Mr. Moody, pre- 
sided, and the speakers included Rev. Dr. E. B. Bates, Rev. Dr. 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. L69 

A. H. Plumb, Rev. Dr. George C. Lorimer, Bishop W. F. Malla- 
lieu, Rev. Herbert J. White, and John Willis Baer, secretary of 
the Society of Christian Endeavor. 

Very often during the meeting there were affecting periods, 
when scores of people wiped away the tears that flowed from 
their eyes. 

Rev. John A. McElwain, of the Clarendon Street Church, led 
in prayer, in which he gave thanks for the "youthful piety, con- 
secrated manhood, and for the work of the Evangelist and the 
Educator." 

Mr. Moore said in part : "We meet here to speak of the life 
and work and influence of the St. Paul of the nineteenth century. 
If I were to sum up in one word the whole, entire life of D. L. 
Mood}' , it would be ' Victory.' He never knew defeat. His life 
was a success. Converted at the age of seventeen in a store here 
on Court street, in Boston, going at nineteen to Chicago, it may 
be said that he there began his life work. In 1872 I became inti- 
mately acquainted with him. He came into my store one day, 
and asking for a pen, he wrote a verse of scripture in this copy of 
Baxter's Testament, and I have carried it as a precious memento 
for twenty-seven years. It was my privilege to work with him, 
and for forty-four days during the Tabernacle meetings here in 
Boston I led the young men's meeting." 

WILL RANK AS A GREAT EDUCATOR. 

Mr. Moore told of his relations with Mr. Moody in the schools 
at Northfield, and said that in a few years he believed Mr. 
Moody's fame would not rest so largely on his evangelistic efforts 
as on his work for education. In the Northfield school were 900 
students, representing seventeen denominations and sixteen 
nationalities. 

" He was a man of prayer," continued Mr. Moore. " I have 
heard him say that if the Almighty were to offer him his choice 
between having his own way or in having God's way, he would 
choose instantly God's way. He prayed up and through every- 
thing. Every building on the beautiful campus at Northfield was 



170 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

prayed up. Every evangelistic campaign was prayed up, and 
after lie started in on them he didn't care what man said. He 
exemplified the words of Scripture : ' If you abide in me, I will 
abide in you.' My heart is full to-day. Oh, how I miss him ! 
But I believe he knows we are meeting here." 

Then telling very fully the scenes at the death-bed of the 
Evangelist, Mr. Moore said : " And his final words were, * God is 
calling me. Earth is receding. Heaven is opening.' I do not 
doubt that God sent his chariot for him, and as he stepped' on it 
he said to his family, ' God is calling me.' As he ascended to 
Heaven he said, ' Earth is receding. Heaven is opening.' And 
as he entered the company of the saints of whom he had preached 
on this earth, I feel that the angels sang, 'Lift up your heads. O, 
ye gates, and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors.' What a 
reception ! What a transition of one of the most wonderful men 
of the nineteenth century." 

A MAN LAMENTED BY EVERYBODY. 

At Mr. Moore's request two verses of the hymn, "Saved by 
Grace," which was a favorite of the Evangelist, were sung by 
Lawrence B. Greenwood. 

Rev. Dr. L. B. Bates said in part : " After an experience of 
fifty years in active life I have never known the press of the nation, 
secular and religious, to be so universal in its lament of any man 
as has been expressed in the departure of this man. While he 
was living they often called on him to halt, but in his death they 
all give him praise. Dwight L. Moody was of the people. He 
never forgot it. Dwight L. Moody was for the people. He never 
forsook them. He preached the Gospel for the people, and he 
never attempted to change it. I have heard him say his faith 
was bolted to God's work." 

Rev. Dr. A. H. Plumb spoke as a pastor of forty years and 
answered very emphatically in the affirmative the questions as to 
what pastors thought of Mr. Moody's work, and whether Moody's 
converts held out, and whether churches have been strengthened. 

"God has spoken to us ? " said Dr, Lorrimer, "not merely 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 171 

through the words of Dwight L. Moody, but through his life, just 
as he spoke through Elijah, Isaiah and John the Baptist. To me 
Moody was just as much a gift of God as was Spurgeon and 
Whitefield, and other men who have been blessed with sacred oil 
and by the laying on of hands. God required a particular man 
for a particular occasion, and He found him in the untaught boy, 
and Moody proved competent for the work. Moody laid emphasis 
on the atoning power of Jesus Christ." 

A letter was read from President Rankin of Howard Univer- 
sity, and then Rev. H. J. White, a graduate of Mr. Moody's Chi- 
cago school, spoke of the work of the Evangelist as he had seen 
it from his station as a part of it. He said that Moody was the 
pastor of pastors, and that the pastors of this generation had had 
a layman for a pastor. He compared Moody to Lincoln in the 
great ruggedness and the wonderful tenderness of his character. 

ELOQUENT TRIBUTE BY BISHOP MALLALIEU. 

Bishop Mallalieu said that the debt of the world to Moody 
would increase as the years multiplied, and paid an eloquent trib- 
ute to the wonderful work he wrought in the religious world. 

A service in memory of Mr. Moody was held in Calvary 
Baptist Church, in West Fifty-seventh street, New York City, at 
the same time as the service of burial at Northfield. It was an 
undenominational service, arranged by friends of Mr. Moody, 
and a number of ministers of different denominations were pres- 
ent. The Rev. Dr. R. S. MacArthur said : 

"Last summer, at the time we opened the tent in Fifty-sixth 
street, I had some correspondence with Mr. Moody relating to his 
preaching in the tent in the afternoon and in this church in the 
evening. He wrote that he was not feeling well, and that he 
feared to undertake so much in hot weather. 'I shall soon be with 
you, though, and we shall have a great service in Calvary Church,' ' 
he said. That service we are now holding in memory of Mr. 
Moody and in honor of his Master and ours. 

" Mr. Moody has now taken his place among the immortals. 
Mr. Moody's evangelism marks an era in the history of evangeli- 



172 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

zation in England and America. Without the learning of the 
schools, he was still an educated man in his sphere. That sphere 
was limited, compared with the sphere of learning of some work- 
ers for God, but Mr. Moody was a willing student in the school 
of Christ, which, after all, is the noblest of all schools. 

" Mr. Moody's work has emphasized the work of the laity in 
religious matters. The laity had too long been neglected in our 
churches, and a great deal of mediaeval superstitution as to the 
exclusive functions of the clergy still remains in our churches. 
Mr. Moody gave dignity to the work of the laity. He was never 
ordained by man. He was ordained of God to be a winner of souls 
and a comforter of saints. 

TENDENCIES OF RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

"I discover two distinct tendencies in the religious life of 
American churches to-day. One is toward High Churchism. 
This is a marked tendency. The old Low Churchism of forty 
years ago has well nigh disappeared. We have the High Church 
and the Broad Church, but very little of what was Low Church. 
Moody was for the Church of Christ. We had in Moody a Christ 
Churchman, irrespective of narrow ecclesiastical lines. Moody's 
enduring monument, I have no doubt, will be the educational work 
at Northfield. That is his enduring monument." 

After the singing of a hymn Dr. Yarnell, of the West Side 
Branch, Young Men's Christian Association, read a telegraph 
message to be sent to Northfield, as follows : 

"Mrs. D. L. Moody and relatives and friends gathered at North- 
field: 

"The friends assembled in memorial services in Calvary 
Church, in New York, unite in expressing sympathy and love. 
Revelation xiv: 13." 

The whole audience stood up in answer to the call for all who 
subscribed to the message. It was at once despatched. 

The Rev. Dr. Hillis, pastor of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, 
spoke eloquently of Air. Moody's work. He said in part : 

"He was in my opinion the greatest Evangelist since White- 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 173 

field, and since the Apostle Paul there has been no man who has 
preached to so great a multitude of people and led so many to 
Christ. To the end of time Mr. Moody's teachings will last. God 
equipped him. Let no man say he was not equipped fully for 
the work. The simplicity of his words went direct to the heart 
of common men; his conscientiousness, his enthusiasm, his 
inspired common sense, his kindness, all made him especially 
fitted for his work." 

There was a mass meeting in memory of Mr. Moody in the 
Hyperion, New Haven, Conn., that was one of the most largely 
attended meetings of the kind on record in that city. Nearly 
every one of the 5,000 people who crowded the theatre and the 
overflow meeting in Calvary Baptist Chnrch, had seen and heard 
Moody in life, and had gathered to do his memory honor. The 
audience filled the great theatre from floor to dome, and among 
them were a large number of Yale students. 

WHOLLY BENT UPON ONE THING. 

.Mr. Sankey was present and sang two hymns during the 
meeting, and rendered each with much feeling. One, entitled 
"Out of the Shadow Land," was written by him the day after 
Moody died. In the chorus of this he was accompanied by the 
audience at his own request. 

The opening address of the service was delivered by Professor 
Fisher, who spoke of the secret of Mr. Moody's power. "He was 
bent upon one subject," said the speaker — "the salvation of men 
in the good old-fashioned scriptural sense of the world. In pur- 
suing that object he manifested peculiar persistency. Had Moody 
been an irritable man, with his limited education, he would have 
been styled a fanatic, but he was not. He had a loving, tender 
nature, which made him truly catholic in all his doings. Mr. 
Drummond said of him that he had never seen a man who reminded 
him so much of the apostles." 

Prof. Fisher here referred to an incident of Moody's life with 
which he himself was familiar, and which he said he related as 
showing the great sincerity of the man. He said that about 



174 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

twenty years ago he spent an evening in company with Thurlow 
Weed of New York, and in the course of the conversation the talk 
tnrned on Moody. Mr. Weed, said the speaker, spoke very warmly 
of Mr. Moody, and said he would send him (Prof. Fisher) a copy 
of what he considered a very remarkable letter, which he had 
received shortly before from Moody. Mr. Weed had been attend- 
ing some of the Moody meetings and had sent a very generous 
gift to the Evangelist as a token of his esteem. It was in acknowl- 
edgement of the gift that Moody wrote the letter. 

This Prof. Fisher produced and read. It acknowledged the 
receipt of the check, and thanked Mr. Weed for his kindness. In 
it, though, Mr. Moody expressed doubt as to whether he should 
accept the gift or not. He asked Mr. Weed whether if he (Moody) 
should reject the gift of money, as he (Mr. Weed) had rejected 
God's gift, he had the right to feel insulted. He expressed sorrow 
that such a noble and true friend should remain unconverted, and 
in closing expressed the hope that when he saw him again it 
would not be so. 

"This," said the speaker, "shows the quality of Moody. His 
forgetfulness of self and devotion to the interests of mankind 
were always his greatest attributes. His memory well deserves 
what honor it is in our power to pay.^ 

IRA D. SANKEY TELLS OF MEETING MR. MOODY 

Following Prof. Fisher, Mr. Welch, chairman of the meeting, 
introduced Ira D. Sankey. Mr. Sankey spoke as follows : "It is 
twenty-nine years since the privilege of traveling the world with 
Mr. Moody was first accorded me. And right here I want to bear 
testimony that a more noble and kind-hearted man I have never 
met. The strong characteristic of Mr. Moody, to my mind, was 
his great common sense. We met in 1870 in Indianapolis. It 
has often been asked how we came together, and for the benefit of 
the young people present I will say that both had begun Chris- 
tian duty early in life. It was the coming together of two 
Christian lives. One of the first things he said to me when we 
met in that prayer meeting — I thank God that we did meet in a 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 175 

prayer meeting — was, Tve been looking for yon for eight years.' 
'You've been looking for me?' I said, and I drew back my hand. 
1 What for ?' He then said he wanted me to go to Chicago with 
him and lead the singing. 

" He had a great deal of tronble in this particular. Sometimes 
he said, the leader of the singing would give out a long meter 
hymn and sing it to a short meter tune. At that time I was 
enjoying a comfortable position, and I said to Mr. Moody, 'I don't 
think I can do it.' Mr. Moody said: ' Oh, I think you will. I 
want you to go home and pray over it, and I'll pray for it also.' It 
wasn't long before Mr. Moody had prayed me clean out of busi- 
ness. Shortly after my meeting with him I met Mr. Moody in 
Chicago, and he invited me to attend an open air meeting with 
him. I accepted, and going with him to his destination, partici- 
pated in what I then thought one of the most remarkable meetings 
I had ever seen. 

PREACHING ON THE STREET. 

"The place selected was a street corner in one of the business 
portions of the city. Nearby was a grocery store, and entering 
this Mr. Moody asked the proprietor if he might use one of his 
unused boxes for a short while. He received permission to, and 
carrying the box with him he left the store. Outside he stood it 
on end, and mounting it he asked me to sing a hymn. I sang 
two, and inside of ten minutes there were more than 300 people 
gathered around us. As soon as he saw that he had an audience, 
Mr. Moody opened his Bible and began to preach, the same as you 
have heard him speak before you. The effect of his words upon 
his audience was wonderful to behold. 

" It was not long before you could see the eyes of the work- 
ingman grow misty and a tear force itself down his cheek. Every- 
one looked up into Mr. Moody's face with a look of wonderment 
showing itself upon them. It was a look of confidence, though, as 
though each one realized the wonderful love this man bore him. 
And after ten minutes of preaching, as the crowd continued to 
swell and grow great, he said, ' Friends, we'll have to close this 



176 MEMORIAL SERVICES. 

meeting. We'll have another one immediately in the opera honse. 
If you'll come with me we'll go there now. Mr. Sankey will sing 
a hymn for ns as we go.' 

" And down the street we went, I singing a hymn, and the 
great crowd trailing at onr heels — a kind of preliminary salvation 
army, as it were. We all crowded into the big opera honse and 
filled it from top to bottom. Mr. Moody j nmped npon the platform 
and preached as I never had heard preaching before. For nearly 
an honr he held them there spell-bonnd, nntil he perceived some 
delegates to the Y. M. C. A. convention, which had met there 
earlier in the afternoon, returning from their supper, prepared to 
resume their session. 

SHOWED HOW TO REACH THE MASSES. 

" They stared with amazement at the vast crowd and at the 
speaker, and doubtless wondered what it all meant. Moody then 
abruptly closed his sermon. ' Let us pray,' he said, and that ended, 
he added, ' The delegates to the Y. M. C. A. convention are at the 
door, waiting to resume their session. They are discussing the 
subject, " How to Reach the Masses."' And then with a wave of 
the hand he dismissed them. 

" I went back to my office the next day and resumed my labors, 
but my heart was not in my work. Shortly after that I handed in 
my resignation to the head of the department and joined Mr. 
Moody. It is said we parted ; but no, we never parted until death 
parted us at Northfield. 

" The last hymn I sung for Mr. Moody was in Dr. Storr's 
church, Brooklyn. My wife and I went down to hear him preach. 
I never tired of hearing Mr. Moody speak. The hymn was curi- 
ously enough the one I sang for him first, * Scatter Seeds of 
Kindness for our Reaping Bye and Bye.' After many years we 
had returned to the same old hymn. I next heard him at Dr. 
Park's church, when he made that celebrated remark; 'Some of 
these days you'll read that D wight L. Moody is dead, but don't 
you believe it.' I next looked upon him in death in Northfield. 
May God bless his memory/' 



MEMORIAL SERVICES. 177 

Henry S.. Coffin, of the Yale Y. M. C. A., was next introduced 
by Mr. Welch. He said he desired to utter a testimonial of affec- 
tion for the late Mr. Moody on behalf of the Yale men, who had 
known and loved the Evangelist. We love to think of Mr. Moody 
as a Yale man, he said. When Yale was under reproach, Mr. 
Moody defended her fair name. During that period, on one occa- 
sion, when asked why he stood up for Yale, he said : " My eldest 
son graduated from Yale, and if his brother gets as much good 
from it as he did, I shall be thankful." To this love Yale has ever 
responded. 

Every year hundreds of her men have attended the confer- 
ences at Northfield, and there have come into close contact with 
Mr. Moody. In colleges opinions undergo a change, and it is to the 
credit of Mr. Moody that he has made that change one for the bet- 
ter in a great many doubtful cases. Devoid of hypocrisy and free 
from all cant phrases, no man was better fitted to hold up to men 
their sins and dangers, and at the same time longingly point out 
the way of escape. His enthusiasm was contagious ; his love for 
men was unbounded. Nature never wove a temper more happy 
than that of Mr. Moody. He will always be remembered by Yale 
men as an exponent of principles. 

12 



CHAPTER X. 

Glowing Tributes to the Memory of the Great Evangelist. 

IRA D. SANKEY received a telegram at Iris home in Brooklyn 
notifying him of Mr. Moody's death. Although Mr. Sankey 
knew that Mr. Moody was seriously ill, the news of his death was a 
surprise, as he had been led to believe that his friend was improving. 

He said : Mr. Moody's death comes upon us with as suddennes 
that is very trying, as we have been receiving letters every day 
from Northfleld speaking of his improvement, as indicated by 
his sleeping and resting better. One letter spoke of his telling 
his son-in-law a little story of how he and I were caught on one 
occasion by the incoming tide near Sunderland, on the north coast 
of England, and of how we had to wade through the water and 
climb a high cliff to reach the land. Had we remained a few 
minutes longer our escape would have been cut off. 

I mention this just as one instance of Mr. Moody's frame of 
mind, as described in these recent letters. I went to see him a 
week ago, but as he was very weak I refrained from going into the 
room where he was. Had I thought then that there was great 
danger of his dying, I would have gone in to have a last word 
with him. 

We were connected in revival work for twenty-seven years. 
We began our joint work at Indianapolis in 1870. He and I were 
delegates to a Young Men's Christian Association convention there, 
and we then became acquainted. Mr. Moody urged me to give up 
the government position I then held and join him in religious 
work in Chicago. I did so after six months' persistence on his 
part. Until he spoke to me about it, I had never had an}^ idea of 
engaging in this work. The story that we ever separated is with- 
out the slightest foundation. It is true that I have been holding 
meetings, singing and speaking both, but this course met with Mr. 
Moody's entire and hearty approval. 

178 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 179 

We last appeared together at Dr. Storr's church last summer. 
The last time I spoke to Mr. Moody was on the last Sabbath he 
was presiding in Dr. Hall's church. I called upon him at the 
Murray Hill Hotel, and we had a long talk. The last letter I 
received from him was just as he was starting on his trip to the 
West. He wrote to me that he would stop at the Murray Hill 
Hotel while in New York on his way West, and would be pleased 
to see me there. I was in Rochester at the time. As soon as I 
received his letter there, I telegraphed him that I would start that 
night for New York, and would call upon him. I arrived at the 
Murray Hill Hotel the next morning, but Mr. Moody had already 
gone West to the meeting where he was taken ill. 

ENORMOUS CONGREGATION IN LONDON. 

What was the greatest meeting we ever addressed ? The one 
in Agricultural Hall, London, during our first visit abroad in 
1874. We had an audience of 17,000. Our biggest meeting in the 
United States was in the Wanamaker Building in Philadelphia in 

1875. 

In my opinion, Mr. Moody was one of the greatest men c^ 
this century in the marvelous common sense he exhibited, in his 
earnestness in his life work, and in his desire to help people and 
to do good. He was the most unselfish man I ever knew, and I 
believe he died without one dollar of money belonging to himself. 
He cared nothing of money for himself, but raised large sums for 
others. 

He was the greatest revivalist of his age. Tens of thousands 
have professed conversion under his preaching in this and in the old 
country. He appeared in every city in this country and in every 
State, from California to Maine, in winter and in summer, in sun- 
shine and in shadow, and never had to give up an appointment on 
account of ill-health. Mr. Moody's health had been running 
down for years. He knew it. The doctors five years ago told 
him that he must cut down the number of his sermons from three 
to two a day. 

I have known for six or eight years that he had weakness of 



180 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

the heart. Tlie knowledge of it was developed by a prominent 
physician in England on onr arrival there in 1892 with the inten- 
tion of going aronnd the world. While talking in London of onr 
proposed trip, friends suggested that Mr. Moody should have his 
heart examined before he attempted to go to India, and as a result 
of this examination the doctor said that a trip to India might 
shorten his life by ten years. We then gave up the proposed trip 
and went to Scotland, where we visited not less than one hundred 
towns during the winter. This was our last trip to that country. 
Mr. Moody was distinguished for his tenderness and kindness 
of heart, although to the public he often seemed one of the most 
brusque of men. He was noted among his intimates for his keen 
sense of humor, though a jest of a low character he would not 
tolerate for a moment. He was especially fond of children, and 
was never happier than when playing on the floor at tops and ball 
with his little ones. He was fond of a good horse, and loved the 
farm, and never tired of protesting that the country was far the 
better place to rear a family. 

MEN WERE AN OPEN BOOK TO HIM. 

He could read men like an open book. As an instance of this, 
he picked out the late Prof. Henry Drummond from a crowd of 
over five hundred young students who attended our meetings in 
Edinburgh, and invited him to travel with us, with the object of 
holding meetings for young men exclusively, and Prof. Drummond 
and I labored for many years together in this capacity. The 
strongest affection grew up between Mr. Moody and Prof. Drum- 
mond, which lasted until Mr. Drummond' s death three } T ears ago, 
and it is said he told the physician who attended him during his 
last illness that Dwight L. Moody was the greatest man he had 
ever known. 

Rev. Russell H. Conwell : He was a man who was not made 
mad by much learning, never confused by the puzzles of science, 
never disturbed in his faith by the guesses of higher critics, never 
permitting his humane feelings to be hindered by studies of 
sociology. All his study and effort was put forth to develop the 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 181 

spiritual side of his nature. He was pre-eminently a constructive 
critic of the Bible, and was peculiarly sensitive to the impulses of 
his conscience. He was too great a man to be disturbed by the 
opinions of others. 

The Rev. John R. Davies : Mr. Moody's work lies along 
different directions. As an educator he built up a system of 
schools which in themselves constitute work enough for the life- 
time of any man. They have in them more than one thousand 
students, and for the housing and educating of these students 
magnificent buildings have been erected. One of the first things 
that should follow the announcement of Mr. Moody's death is an 
effort on the part of Mr. Moody's friends to raise a sum of money 
sufficient to endow these schools that the work might be perpetu- 
ated. 

EULOGIZED BY MR. WANAMAKER. 

John Wanamaker: It almost overpowers me to think that 
Mr. Moody, one of my earliest friends, has passed on. I felt 
strangely impressed by his words and manner, about the middle 
of November, when he was last in Philadelphia talking over the 
pleasing prospects to him of a series of meetings here this winter. 
In this great century j ust closing, no other one man, through so 
many of its years, stands out as prominently in labors for the pub- 
lic good as Dwight L- Moody. 

My acquaintance with Mr. Moody runs back forty years or 
more, when he was just emerging from business and attracting 
attention in Chicago by his resolute and resistless efforts in relig- 
ious work. We came together often. My house was his home, 
especially after the Chicago fire, when he walked out from his 
flame-lit house with his little family, saving nothing but his per- 
sonal Bible. We were together several months at the time, and 
gathered the money mainly in New England for the rebuilding of 
the Illinois Street Mission. Soon after the fire he made the 
acquaintance of Mr. Sankey and founded the connection with which 
work in England began at York. 

Stretching over the years that intervened, up to this year, I 
have enjoyed the inspiration of his life. The freshest memory I 



182 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

have of him is the night of November 13th, when he got off the 
Pennsylvania Railroad train to keep an appointment he had made 
with me by telegraph, to spend a short time between trains, on his 
way to Kansas City for his last meetings. I remarked that same 
night after he had left me, how heavy a bnrden seemed to rest 
npon his heart, as he said again and again, "I wish that I might 
be moved of God to move one large Eastern city. For I think if 
one Eastern city conld be thoronghly revived, the others wonld 
feel the influence and be stirred likewise." 

As I looked into the face of the man, whose eyes and voice 
were full of tears, it seemed as if a prophet like unto Elijah had 
come back again. He left behind him that night his comfortable 
home at Northfield, and the hospitality which so many friends 
would have been glad to have given him ; laid himself down in a 
sleeping birth of a Pullman car, rattling over a thousand miles to 
Kansas City, and rose with a heavy load of concern for the King- 
dom of his Master, and under the weight of it he staggered into a 

grave. 

HIS DEATH A NATIONAL CALAMITY. 

General Ballington Booth, President of the Volunteers of 
America : I regard the death of Dwight L. Moody as little short 
of a national calamity. He was the John the Baptist in the wilds 
and wastes of the world's sin. His forte, perhaps, lay most in stir- 
ring up and bringing to life the flagging columns of the Christian 
Church. I feel like asking the question that was asked of a great 
Spartan leader, "Who will take up his sword?" 

American prelates in the Methodist Episcopal and Roman 
Catholic churches united in paying tribute to the memory of 
Mr. Moody. Sectarianism was set aside as they talked of his 
great life work. Their views are tersely given in the following 
statements : 

Bishop John L. Spalding, Roman Catholic, Peoria : I have 
watched his career as a Christian minister, and I have always 
looked upon him as a sincere, earnest and successful worker. 
He was a devoted man. He has done a great deal of good for 
mankind. I heard him preach in New York when he was with 









GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 183 

Mr. Sankey, and I consider him a very effective preacher. I 
greatly regret to hear of his death. 

Bishop Charles C. Grafton, Roman Catholic, Fond dn Lac, 
Wis. : Without college education or theological training, Mr. 
Mood}- accomplished a remarkable work. He combined with a 
strong constitution, marked personality and remarkable vigor, a 
a great knowledge of men and how to deal with them. Everyone 
was impressed with his straightforwardness and sincerity. There 
was nothing of the manufactured, pasteboard rhetoric which is the 
stock in trade of many popular preachers. He had not the wealth 
of imagination nor the brilliancy of communication which was 
characteristic of Mr. Beecher, but he drew larger audiences and 
left greater impressions probably than any other preacher of the 
Gospel of our day. His arrangement of a sermon was the simplest 
possible construction, and consisted largely of the text and para- 
phrases, interspersed with pithy, epigramatic thrusts. His aim 
was to point men to Christ! I asked my people from my pul- 
pit when I heard he was ill to pray for him, and now that he has 
passed away I follow him with my "requiescat in pace." We may 
believe he belonged, as St. Augustine said, to the soul of the 
Catholic Church, though he might not have been in communion 
with its visible body. 

HIS GRANDEST HOPES REALIZED. 

Bishop Theodore N. Morrison, Episcopalian, Davenport, la. : 
In the death of Mr. Moody, as in the death of all good men, we 
cannot but have mingled feelings of joy and sorrow. For years 
he lived under the conviction that death meant life ; that the larger, 
fuller existence was only to be known in the world beyond. He 
loved God and served the Lord Jesus. Now he has come to the 
realization of all he has been hoping for and believing in. This 
life for him meant much, but the life beyond meant more. He has 
suffered no loss, but gained all. Yet the world will miss his earn- 
est and wise activity in behalf of all good causes. 

His courage and faith were an inspiration to multitudes, and 
his conscientious life was a testimony more impressive than most 



184 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

sermons. God had given him many gifts and he nsed them faith- 
fully. His unusual common sense, his genuineness, his manly 
Christian directness, gave him great power.- One thing character- 
ized his life and work — he grew all the time. One has difficulty 
in realizing that the Dwight L. Moody who organized the work at 
Northfield was the Dwight L. Moody preaching -in the missions 
about Chicago a generation ago. He was a prophet. # The world 
is a better world because he has lived in it, and he has won his 
crown. 

Bishop John H. Vincent, Methodist, Topeka, Kan. : I knew 
Mr. Moody when he was a humble clerk in Chicago, and an active, 
intense, courageous worker in the Y. M. C. A. He went into his 
religious work with untiring zeal. He never cared what people 
thought about him. He believed in the Lord Jesus Christ with 
every fibre of his being. He invited, appealed, reproved, rebuked 
with apparently no anxiety as to his reputation or personal inter- 
est. I knew him in the Christian commission and in early Sun- 
day-school work in the sixties. 

A MAN OF RARE COMMON SENSE. 

I met him in London in the early seventies, before he had 
gained wide reputation. I went with him for a week of private 
meetings in Dublin. It was a week of heart searching and prayer. 
Mr. Moody was a man of God, honest, earnest, and faithful. He 
was a man of intellectual power and was pre-eminently a man 
of common sense. He rarely made a mistake. He had a great 
power over man. He had power with God. A mighty man in 
Israel has been called away. 

Bishop Isaac W. Joyce, Methodist, Minneapolis : I knew Mr. 
Moody for twenty-five years, and met him on many occasions. He 
was one of the purest and truest men I ever knew. He was a most 
thoughtful and careful student of the Bible, and seemed to under- 
stand the different departments of that book and know how to use 
them with great effect among his congregations. He was a great 
friend of young men, and had a great influence upon them. He 
was a remarkable reader of human nature, and seemed intuitively 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 185 

to understand how to apply the truth to men in keeping with their 
disposition and nature. 

His Gospel songs, which he and Mr. Sankey published, have 
been translated into nearly all languages spoken among Christian 
nations, and have had a marvelous effect. I have heard his songs 
sung by natives in their own tongue in China, Japan, and Corea. 
The Church of Jesus Christ has lost one of the most effective 
workers it ever had. 

A THOROUGH BELIEVER IN THE BIBLE. 

Bishop Henry W. Warren, Methodist, Denver : Above all 
other things two reasons for Mr. Moody's influence must be stated. 
First, he believed thoroughly and emphatically in the Bible as a 
reliable record of God's dealing with man, past, present, and future. 
He was troubled by no doubts, entangled by no higher criticism, 
appalled by no impossibilities. He thought what was impossible 
with man might be possible with God, in the word as in the world. 
Second, he believed that God was as really a helper of His humble 
and obedient instruments to-day as ever in the past. It is said 
that someone remarked in his presence, while yet a young man, 
11 God still waits to show what He can do by a man thoroughly 
given up and consecrated to His service." It is said that young 
Moody replied : " Then He need not wait any longer for here is 
the man." 

Bishop Cheney, Episcopalian : No one who knew Mr. Moody 
personally and in his public work, as it was my privilege to do. 
can say other than one thing, and that, that he was a man sent by 
God to do a work that no other man of his generation was fitted 
to do. I knew him to have been a most single hearted, devoted 
preacher of the pure Gospel. The results wrought by his instru- 
mentality were greater than those obtained by any other religious 
teacher of modern times. Mr. Moody's career is a wonderful tes- 
timony to a fact which is now either ignored or denied very largely 
inside and outside of the church. I mean that it proves that the 
true way to change men's lives, conduct and character is by 
preaching doctrinal truth. 



186 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

Men cry out against doctrinal preaching and ask for practical 
results. Mr. Moody's work showed that the way to obtain those 
practical results is through the instrumentality of preaching the 
great principles of evangelical religion. By his death Christianity 
has suffered the greatest loss in many long years. But surely his 
work will live after him. I knew Mr. Moody for thirty-five years, 
and only last October, when I was returning from abroad, we came 
from the East to Chicago on the same train. He was then appar- 
ently in good health, and he told me *he never felt better in 
his life. The intensity of his life and work must have been 
telling upon him during all the years. 

MISS WILLARD'S EFFICIENT AID. 

An indication of Mr. Moody's power is to be found in the 
estimates of him both by laymen, women and clergymen. The 
manner in which he impressed them most was a little different in 
each case, as individuals differ, with the same result always, of 
course. The following come from clergymen and others identi- 
fied with church work : 

Mrs. Helen M. Barker : Mr. Moody and Miss Willard were 
fast friends for many years. They were associated in a series of 
very successful revival meetings in Boston before Miss Willard' s 
fame had become national. Recognizing her merit in the tem- 
perance work which she had been conducting in Chicago, Mr. 
Moody urged her to accompany him to Boston, where she took 
charge of the woman's division of the service. They each felt a 
Divine calling. Mr. Moody was an evangelist and Miss Willard 
was a temperence worker. Very efficient help was rendered by 
Miss Willard during Mr. Moody's remarkable campaign in 
Boston. Large numbers of ladies embracing the most cultured, 
as well as the poorest and most unlettered, attended her meetings, 
charmed by her eloquence and swayed by her magnetic influence. 

I think the greatest work ever accomplished by Mr. Moody 
was the establishment of the system of schools throughout the 
United States where it is made possible for men to go and study 
the Bible, The schools are not denominational. Mr. Moody's 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODV. 187 

creed was to save souls, and his colleges were conducted to this 
end and also to instruct young ministers in the most expedient 
means of reaching men. His death will be one of the greatest 
losses ever sustained by the cause of Christ. 

Dr. Herrick Johnson : Moody was one of the tremendous 
moral forces of the generation. He had a combination of qualities 
which made it impossible that he should be any less than a leader 
of men. Take his physical characteristics as indication of the 
real man. The lower part of his head denoted power, will and a 
great ability to command men. His eye had the gentleness of the 
master, full of tenderness and sympathy, indicating a great heart. 
Those two physical characteristics marked the man. He was 
Buny an's Mr. Great-heart. He had the indomitable energy and 
resistless force that characterized the Apostle Paul. These, com- 
bined with his tender heart, made him what he was among men. I 
heard him when he made his first excursion east to Philadelphia. 
While at first his address was marked by a disregard of the cour- 
tesy and propriety that should prevail among Christians with 
respect to each other, yet he grew all away from that and came to 
be very generous in his judgment of the church and man. 

HAD THE CONFIDENCE OF THE WHOLE CHURCH. 

In his trip abroad he commanded a hearing that few men ever 
had. His work broadened and deepened as time went on until he 
commanded the confidence of the Christian Church. I do not 
think it possible for another man to reach the height that he 
gained. Business men trusted him and were ever ready to commit 
to his care any sum he asked for. Wealthy people of Chicago 
considered it a good investment to hand over money to Mr. Moody. 
He has left behind a record that any man might envy. " They that 
turn many to righteousness shall shine as a star forever and 
ever." Two things he knew, the Bible and men. Both must be 
known by any man who aspires to spiritual leadership. That 
well-worn Bible which he carried under his arm he had studied 
and pondered over until its truths were enwrought into the very 
blood and fibre of his spiritual manhood. 



i88 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

John V. Farwell : Mr. Moody was one of the most remarkable 
men it has ever been my privilege to meet. He was, to my mind, 
the greatest evangelist since the time of Paul, the one who has 
preached to more people than any man that ever lived. He was a 
man originally with little education, yet he lifted himself from 
among the common people and became one of the greatest men the 
world has ever known. He would have been a great man in any 
vocation he had chosen, and made fewer mistakes than any man I 
ever knew. He was one of the most practical of men, and com- 
bined with a good head he had a good heart. With all this he was 
unusually reticent in regard to his personal affairs, and his one 
prayer after he had achieved success was that God would keep 
him humble. 

I knew Moody shortly after he came to Chicago, when he was 
quite a young man, and after he had established his first Sunday- 
school in North Market Hall. I was his assistant in the work. 
For some time after coming here he clerked in a shoe store, and 
later ran a little store of his own for a number of years, devoting 
a great part of his time to religious work. 

MONEY WENT TO CHARITY. 

When he finally gave up business to devote all his time to 
his chosen work he had some money, but this did not last long, 
most of it being given to charity. Part of the money was used to 
pay rent for the room in which he started his first mission, and, 
besides sweeping out the place and doing the j anitor work, Moody 
for a long time slept on the benches, and for his meals ate cheese 
and crackers, in order that he might save money for carrying out 
his gospel work. 

I well remember the first time Moody preached. He did it 
because he was compelled to do so or to have no preaching. His 
work had attracted attention, and a little church had been built 
for him on Illinois street, between Wells and LaSalle avenue. I 
believe the place is now a harness shop. This church Moody 
looked after, and would invite students from the different theolog- 
ical schools to preach. One night when the church was filled the 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 189 

preacher failed to get there and Moody was in despair. I said to 
him: "Moody, preach the sermon yourself," and rather than dis- 
appoint the congregation he did so, and this was his first sermon. 
It was jnst what the people wanted, too, for they would much rather 
hear him than any one else. 

It was due to Moody's effort that the Young Men's Christian 
Association Building in Chicago was built. We tried to hire him 
to take charge of the work, but he refused the salary and took hold 
of the work without receiving any money. He was a grand man 
to meet personally — always doing something to help along those 
who needed it most. 

ANOINTED FROM ON HIGH. 

Rev. Dr. A. J. Gordon : Though Dwight L. Moody was set 
apart by no council, and received no laying on of consecrating 
hands, he yet exhibited such signs of an apostle that the whole 
Church of God heard him gladly. How he began his Christian 
life, and how he advanced step by step from the humblest to the 
highest Christian service, is too well known to need rehearsing. 
Coming to Boston from his country home in Northfield to find 
employment, he was himself found by the Lord, and under the 
ministry of that gracious man of God, Dr. E. N. Kirk, he entered 
on his membership in the Christian Church. He was educated 
for the ministry by ministering in all ways and in all times to 
those needing help. We have heard him tell of his resolve, early 
made and persistently carried out, of allowing no day to pass without 
urging upon some soul the claims of Christ. 

Thus he learned to preach to the hundreds by preaching to 
the one. And no doubt much of the directness and point of his 
style was due to this habit of personal dealing with souls. In 
preaching it is easier to harangue a multitude than to hit a man. 
But he who knows how to do the latter has the highest qualifica- 
tion for doing the former. Personal preaching that has a "Thou 
art the man" at the point of every sermon needs only to be multi- 
plied by one hundred or one thousand to become popular preach- 
ing of the best sort. This was the style of the eminent Evan- 



190 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

gelist. He dealt with, the personal conscience in the plainest and 
most pungent Saxon, so that the common people heard him gladly 
and the nncommon people did not fail to give him their ears. 

Yet his power did not lie altogether in his words, bnt qnite as 
much in his administrative energy. Robert Hall was a preacher 
of transcendent genius, often producing an impression upon his 
hearers quite unmatched in the history of pulpit oratory. Yet the 
results of his ministry were comparatively meager ; he was a 
great preacher, but not a great doer. On the contrary, John Wes- 
ley, by no means Hall's equal as a pulpit orator, because of his 
extraordinary executive gifts, moved a whole generation with a 
new religious impulse. In like manner Spurgeon, by yoking a 
rare preaching talent with a not less remarkable working talent, 
and keeping the two constantly abreast, accomplished a ministry 
which for largeness of results and extent of influence has possibly 
no equal in recent centuries. 

COULD BRING THINGS TO PASS. 

Mr. Moody was not an ordained minister, but he was more 
fortunate in being a preordained worker, as well as a foreordained 
preacher. A genius for bringing things to pass, a talent for 
organizing campaigns on a large scale, selecting co-workers with 
singular wisdom and placing them in the most advantageous 
positions — this is the notable thing which appears in the charac- 
ter and career of the Evangelist. 

"The governor" is the name which we constantly heard 
applied to the late pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Mr. 
Spurgeon, as he moved about among his congregation in London. 
The American Evangelist easily won for himself the title of 
"general" among his fellow laborers in the Gospel. He managed 
the campaign, not imperiously, indeed, but with such Napoleanic 
command of the situation and such mastery of resources that all 
his co-laborers rejoiced to yield him the pre-eminence. 

We venture to say, indeed, that anyone who has been much 
at his headquarters will find here the greatest occasion for admir- 
ation. The number and extent of religious enterprises which he 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 191 

could keep in hand at once, the thoroughness with which he could 
command every detail, the inspiration and cheer which he can put 
into a great army of workers gathered about him — this we observed 
with a surprise that increased every year, 

And with all this there was another talent which we have 
learned to value more and more in public men — a grand talent for 
silence. It is a rare thing for one to be as effective in saying 
nothing as he is in speaking. When a friend of Von Moltke was 
asked the secret of that great general's success in managing men, 
he replied, " He knew how to hold his tongue in seven different 
languages." Blessed is the man who can refrain his lips from 
speaking injudiciously, and his mouth that it utter no hasty word. 
In dealing with co-laborers endowed with all sorts and sizes of 
temper this is an indispensable requirement. To push on the 
work steadily meantime, giving offense to none and holding the 
forces in order and harmony, is a great achievement. It requires 
a wise silence as well as a positive utterance to do this success- 
fully. 

ENDOWED WITH GREAT ENERGY. 

A mightily energetic man was he and a singularly prudent 
man, one who generated great force by his preaching and his per- 
sonality, but who knew at the same time how to prevent hot boxes 
on his train of religious enterprises by avoiding friction, which 
imprudent speech always genders. 

Rev. Dr. George A. Rees : From across the Pacific comes to 
us the message of death for one of the bravest and best of our 
generals, Lawton, who fell on the battlefield, when most of us had 
hoped that peace was at hand. Another and still deeper knell is 
heard vibrating in the universal Christian heart, for one no less 
great as a general of a mighty host has fallen in the midst of a 
great campaign for Christ and the Church. The quick impetuos- 
ity of his style, the unconventional modes of address, held vast 
audiences spell-bound. Laughter and tears could be seen at almost 
any service he conducted. He has gone, his life-work done. He 
has entered the Master's joy. Let us follow his footsteps. 

Rev. Dr. Stephen W. Dana : At this Christmastide, when the 



192 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

hearts of so many are made glad, there are always shadows resting 
on some homes. The Christian Chnrch of this conntry has been 
greatly saddened by the death of Dwight L. Moody. It is not my 
intention to deliver or make an extended enlogy, bnt it seems 
fitting a word should be spoken concerning one who has done so 
much for Christ during the last generation. Judged by all Bib- 
lical standards, he was a great man. Though starting life with a 
limited education, he acquired a far better knowledge of the Bible 
than many a minister who passed through a college and seminary 
course. Though lacking a liberal education, he gained a great 
influence over college men. 

SINCERITY NEVER DOUBTED. 

The very sincerity of his convictions and the earnestness of 
his manner carried weight with all classes. Such a man as Pro- 
fessor Drummond, of Scotland, whose writings are so widely known, 
and who was such a power for good among students in Great 
Britain and the United States, felt that he was more indebted to 
Mr. Moody than to any other man for the Christian influence he 
was permitted to exert. Though Mr. Moody is dead, he still 
speaks to us, and his influence for good will never die. 

Rev. J. B. Jackson — My acquaintance with Mr. Moody was 
gained from hearing him and meeting him at his meetings in Chi- 
cago while I was in active ministerial work. My most vivid recol- 
lections of him are when, with the assistance of Mr. Sankey, he 
was holding a series of meetings in a tabernacle erected by J. V. 
Farwell in the downtown district, Chicago. This was the winter 
of 1877 and 1878. He demonstrated his power over people in those 
days as few men have ever done. 

It seemed to me as I watched those meetings that the people 
were under some kind of a spell. Persons who ordinarily were 
indifferent to religious matters went and remained for an entire 
day perfectly absorbed. I experienced the same interest. He had 
the ability to say a great deal in a short time. His talks were 
always lucid, but concise and fervid, and carried truths home to 
the learned as well as the untutored. This ability to interest and 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MY. MOODY. 193 

influence the learned as well as those who were not highly educated 
is to my mind a proof of his greatness. 

From a personal friend : The last time I saw Mr. Moody was 
when Campbell Morgan, under his auspices, was holding meetings 
in Boston in October. Calling upon the latter at the Hotel Belle- 
vue, I was ushered, not only into his presence, but that of the 
Evangelist himself, his wife and his stanch coadjutor in all good 
labors, Henry M. Moore. I remember the interest with which Mr. 
Moody listened to Mr. Morgan's account of what his London 
church was doing in the way of evangelistic services on Sunday 
evenings. The conversation then drifted into a general discussion 
touching ways of winning the outsiders, and it was easy for 
him to talk on this. 

ALWAYS EAGER TO LEARN. 

It was plain that no subject interested Mr. Moody so pro- 
foundly as this. He was eager to learn about methods being 
employed here and there. I could see that the main reason why 
Mr. Moody feared the higher criticism agitation was lest it should 
paralyze the spiritual power of the churches. It seemed to him 
that the new views often made ministers and la}^men unspiritual, 
and he would not hesitate, in private conversation, to point to 
specific instances where that result could not be denied. I am 
glad that my last impression of him, received during what must 
have been his final visit to Boston, was of his tremendous earnest- 
ness in the matter of saving souls. It seems now as if he must 
have realized, even then, that the time was short. 

Every great man is to be judged in part by the men who 
compose his circle of friends. In one sense Mr. Moody's person- 
ality was not a winsome one. He was often brusque, always 
decided in his manner, but this very straightforwardness and sin- 
cerity drew about him all types of men. Every one knows how 
Drummond loved him, and Stalker and George Adam Smith 
thought that no visit to this country was complete without a 
sojourn at Northfield. What a potent spell, too, he exercised over 
other Britishers, like Meyer and Webb-Peploe, Macgregor, Morgan 

13 



194 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

and Andrew Mnrray. When He wanted any of them at a North- 
field conference he wonld not take "No" for an answer. 

Once, when Mr. Meyer was hard pressed with work at home, 
Mr. Moody deputed a man to pack his gripsack and cross the 
Atlantic b}^ the next steamer in order to prevail npon Mr. Meyer 
to come hither at the time desired. This mission, it is needless 
to say, was successful. In selecting and securing earnest speak- 
ers, in attaching them to himself as well as choosing lieutenants 
and subordinates for positions in his schools and in carrying out 
his evangelistic and educational designs, Mr. Moody displayed his 
rare executive gifts. 

HE SWAYED AND MOULDED MEN. 

Think, too, of the men whose career he has shaped. Drum- 
mond always confessed that he owed to Mr. Moody his first 
impulse to the service of his fellows, and gained from him guid- 
ance and inspiration. Dr. Grenfell, doing splendid work on the 
coast of Labrador, and among the fishermen in the North Sea, 
dates his consecration to this form of work to the sermon he heard 
in East London, years ago, from Air. Mood}^. If the list could be 
made up of men serving Christ in important positions to-da} T whom 
Mr. Moody started in their paths of ministration, it would be a 
long and impressive one. 

Add to it the countless numbers whom he has led from dark- 
ness into light, and who are still witnessing through their redeemed 
manhood and womanhood to his transforming touch upon their 
lives, and we may gain some idea of the extent and quality of the 
mourning for him in every great city, and in numberless smaller 
places throughout our land, aye, and in London, Liverpool, 
Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dublin, and scores of other English cities 
and towns, whither the news of his sudden death was flashed. 

Serious as he always seemed, earnest as he was, he had his 
sportive side, too. He got a great deal of fun out of life, for he 
possessed that essential for obtaining fun, the discerning eye 
which sees ludicrous situations. Dr. George Adam Smith told 
me, after visiting him in June, that he spent a whole evening with 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 196 

Mr. Moody when the two did little but exchange good stories. 
Next morning they came down to breakfast and began where they 
left off, and another string of amusing tales enlivened the com- 
pany at the table. 

Then came family prayers, and Mr. Moody's first words when 
he knelt were, "Lord, we thank Thee for the good times we have 
been having." His humor used to crop out noticeably when he 
was raising money for good causes. He liked to turn, with a 
quiet chuckle, to this or that well-to-do layman, who might be sit- 
ting in the hall at Northfield, and say, "Jones, I have put you 
down for $100," or, "Smith, I know you want to complete this 
subscription; there is only $50 lacking." His bright, sharp, brief 
comments on men and things were continually adding spice to his 
platform work. 

DEVOTED LOVER OF HIS FAMILY. 

No man ever loved his family better. Many of us recall his 
devotion to bis mother — dear Grandma Moody — who passed away 
at a great age. His home was near hers, and no day was so busy 
as to cause him to miss a call upon her. And the bright-eyed, 
well-preserved, keen old lady and he must have bad many a 
good time together. She said once, "I always thought D. L. 
would be one thing or the other," and it was good that she lived to 
see that it was the "one thing" rather than "the other," and the 
"one thing" with all his might and main. All these years his 
wife was a strong support to him. Her calm and gracious manner, 
and her unusual capacity for practical affairs had no small part, 
perhaps, in the efficiency of his public service. 

It must have been a joy to him, too, that his children fol- 
lowed in his footsteps in their love for the things of the king- 
dom. His oldest son, in late years, was a great help to him. 
It was the little daughter of this son, by the way, who passed 
away after a painful illness, and then the Evangelist's great heart 
was bowed with sorrow. Years before this Mr. Moody said : 
"There are three great joys. The first is the joy of our own 
salvation, the second is the joy of bringing some else to Christ 



196 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

The greatest joy is that of seeing one's children walking in the 
truth when one is in his old age." How good is it that the Evan- 
gelist himself experienced so richly this threefold joy. 

Many monuments to Mr. Moody will be proposed, and we 
believe that his host of friends here and in England will see to 
it that none of the interests which were dear to him shall now 
surfer or languish. But if we could know the deepest yearning 
of his heart, as from the heavenly world he looks, down upon the 
earth where he wrought his work, I believe it would be not for 
an3^thing to perpetuate his name, but for an awakening in the 
whole Church of Christ to its duty to sinful and needy human- 
ity everywhere. It was this for which he toiled and prayed and 
pleaded while here, and the best monument any Christian man 
or any Christian Church can rear to this servant of God, will be 
a vow to strive for the same spiritual power over the hearts of 

others. 

UPON WHOM SHALL HIS MANTLE FALL? 

Rev. Dr. Craven : A despatch from the East to our Chicago 
daily prayer-meeting informs us that D. L. Moody has passed 
away. Oh, what a glorious departure ! Oh, what a welcome he 
must have received in the heavenly world ! It was the same Gos- 
pel which we preach here to-day that he believed with all his heart, 
and that made him the man he was. I do pray God that He will 
give us some man upon whom his mantle will fall, and who may 
be endued with his spirit. 

Rev. Dr. Brushingham : As I passed into the hall I heard of 
Mr. Moody's death, and felt that the only theme St for this occa- 
sion was " Eternal Life." This a solemn hour with us, but not 
not one of mourning. As Ruskin says, why should we mourn 
when one of God's guests is called home ? People say sometimes : 
" Why cannot you preachers take one world at a time, and not preach 
so much about the world to come?" The reason is that there is 
no fact that affects the present life like the doctrine of a future 
life. 

Do you think that the glorified Moody was any less a good 
citizen, any less a loving husband, and any less loyal to the flag 







CO 
LjJ 

1-2 
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cc 

Hi 

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PROF. DANIEL B. TOWNER 

THE CELEBRATED SINGER WHO ASSISTED MR. MOODY IN MANY OF HIS 
EVANGELISTIC MEETINGS 



GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. (07 

of his country because his citizenship was in heaven ? It is ever 

the man with a faith in the life to come who is the most practical, 
the most progressive, and the most successful in his worldly pur- 
suits. It is the power of an endless life that men need to tone up 
their faculties. Why are the newspapers stuffed with the accounts 
of suicides ? Because the burdens of this life are unintelligible 
and intolerable apart from the life to come. 

Rev. Dr. Bodine : He was a great leader, and at the end of 
life could* say, with St. Paul, "I have fought the good fight; 
I have finished my course ; I have kept the faith ; thenceforth 
there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness." He con- 
quered by realizing that he must arouse himself to full energy, 
throwing off every incumbrance ; that he must patiently endure, 
and that he must look to Jesus for encouragement and for strength. 
He was a noble one, indeed; one worthy of being an example. He 
was led of God and made a power through him to lead others. In 
his work and the great good he has done, he was one of the great- 
est men of our generation. No better ambition could be ours 
than to follow him as he followed the Lord Jesus Christ. His life 
shall live on, for such a life can never die. 

VIGOROUS BLOWS IN THE BATTLE. 

Henry Drummond : Were one asked what on the human side 
were the effective ingredients in Mr. Moody's sermons, one would 
find the answer difficult. Probably the foremost is the tremendous 
conviction with which they are uttered. Next to that are their 
point and direction. Every blow is straight from the shoulder, 
and every stroke tells. Whatever canons they violate, whatever 
fault the critics may find with their art, their rhetoric, or even with 
their theology, as appeals to the people they do their work with 
extraordinary power. If eloquence is measured by its effect upon 
an audience and not by its balanced sentences and cumulative 
periods, then there is eloquence of the highest order. In sheer 
persuasiveness Mr. Moody had few equals, and, rugged as his 
preaching may seem to some, there is in it a pathos of a quality 
which few orators have ever reached, and appealing tenderness 



198 GLOWING TRIBUTES TO MR. MOODY. 

which not only wholly redeems it, bnt raises is not nnseldom 
almost to sublimity. 

Dr. Lyman Abbott : Mr. Moody was the greatest evangelist 
of his time, and, with the exception of Whitefield, the greatest of 
all time. I differ from him as to the atonement question. He 
believed that Christ atoned for all our sins. I believe I must die 
for myself, and no man can do it for me. He was a broad man. 
He asked Mr. Beecher to enter evangelical work with him, and 
they compared notes for an hour. If he had been a narrow man 
he would not have done that. I did not measure him by his theol- 
ogy, nor he I. We were warm personal friends. I thank God for 
him. The evangelical work he exemplified will never pass away, 
for if it did there would be a dead Church. 



CHAPTER XI. 

Reminiscences of Mr. Moody. 

TN STRANGE contrast to the many valuable oil paintings which 
1 adorn the walls of the Northfield home of Dwight L. Moody, 
hang two modest little photographs, framed in plain oak, which 
were said to be dearer to the heart of the great Evangelist than 
his entire collection of canvases painted by master hands. The 
photographs, are of particular interest, as they mark the 
beginning of the evangelistic work to which he devoted his very 
active life. 

The photographs occupy prominent places on the wall of Mr. 
Moody's favorite room, and the strange contrast between their 
almost shabby appearance and that of their handsome neighbors 
attracts the immediate attention of all who enter. The pictures 
are eight by ten inches in size, and in the handwriting of the great 
Evangelist is written on one, "Does it pay?" On the other, "It 
does." In response to inquiries, Mr. Moody often laughingly 
referred to the pictures as his "before and after taking" signs. 

The pictures are companions, and Mr. Moody always said 
one would be incomplete without the other. The first shows a 
group of fourteen street gamins, ragged and dirty, such as can be 
found in the slums of any great city, with Mr. Moody and John 
V. Farwell, of Chicago, in the background. The second shows 
twelve of the same boys, clean and prim and neatly dressed in the 
garments boys of their ages wore many years ago. The pictures 
are of peculiar interest to Chicagoans, as they were taken in that 
city, and the boys composed the first class ever taught the Gospel 
by the man who afterward preached to more persons and led more 
to salvation than any man since the days of Paul. 

Among those who knew Mr. Moody in the early days and 
have been connected with him in his work since, the boys are 
spoken of as " the class on the log," and have often been cited by 

199 



200 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

Mr. Moody's followers as an example to follow. Mr. Moody 
began His evangelistic work in Chicago. Shortly after his arrival 
in the city from Boston, he secured employment as a clerk in a 
shoe store, and in a few years went into business for himself in a 
small way. He was a regular attendant at the old Plymouth 
Church, and from his meagre savings rented four pews, which he 
induced young men whom he met to occupy, often going person- 
all}' to bring them in. 

In the presence of the church people he was of a rather back- 
ward disposition, seldom taking a leading part in the services. 
This apparent shyness, added to a rather hesitating, awkward 
manner of expressing his thoughts, caused his real earnestness 
and zeal to go for a long time unnoticed, until one day the super- 
intendent of the Sunday-school was surprised when young Moody 
asked to be allowed to teach a class. 

REQUEST POLITELY DECLINED. 

He was put off with the statement that there was no vacancy, 
the true cause beino;, it is said, that it was not believed he was 
capable of teaching. Determined to preach the Gospel, Moody set 
about getting up a class of his own. While wandering about the 
lower part of the city Moody had picked up acquaintance with a 
number of street urchins, mostly wharf rats, newsboys, and boot- 
blacks. 

Gathering five or six of these together on Sunday morning, 
Mood} 7 marched them down to the lake shore, north of the mouth 
of the Chicago river, which at that time was a sandy beach, and 
there established his first Snnday-school. A huge log lay half 
buried in the sand, and on this Moody seated his pupils, and, 
standing in front of them, taught from his Bible the same les- 
sons that the more favored children were studying in the churches. 
The class grew until it reached eighteen members, and each Sun- 
day assembled on the sand, and Sunday-school was held on the 
log. 

A second time Mood)- made his request to be allowed to teach 
in the Plymouth Sunday-school, where nothing was known of the 



REMINISCENCES OF MR MOODY. 201 

"class on the log." He was again told there was no vacancy, but 
this time the information was added that he could teach if he 
would bring- a class of his own. This was all Moody wanted, and 
the following Sunday he met his boys on the beach and marched 
them direct to Plymouth Church. 

Arriving there, he marched at their head into the church, 
down the long aisle, and seated them in two vacant pews near the 
front, where he began the morning lesson as if nothing unusual 
had occurred. The sight of the eighteen dirty little ragamuffins 
created considerable of a commotion in the church, but Moody paid 
no attention, and continued with the lesson. Moody's class was a 
permanent institution in the church after that day. 

MR. MOODY STRICKEN IN KANSAS CITY. 

When Mr. Moody was smitten by heart failure, he was in full 
tide of a great meeting in Kansas City. There were several meet- 
ings a day, attended by from 10,000 to 15,000 people, and Mr. 
Moody's power over these masses was most remarkable. An 
instance of this was on a Wednesday night. Holding out both 
arms, he cried: "All that are here who want God's help, say 
aloud, ' Lord help me.'" He waited expectant. A feeble few, half 
ashamed, echoed the words, " Lord, help me." 

" Again," commanded the evangelist. The second reply was 
much more powerful than the first. " Lord — help — me," answered 
several hundred voices. 

Mr. Moody dropped his arms. 

" Do you believe he heard you ?" 

" Yes," replied those who had repeated his words. 

" He is here to-night," said Mr. Moody, solemnly. " He is 
listening to yon. He is with you. Oh, what a sight ! All these 
people crying to the Lord for help ! Let us all say, * Lord, remem- 
ber me.'" 

A mighty chorus echoed back : " Lord, remember — me." 

The evangelist continually spoke short sentences of power 
that impressed his hearers. " You can find 1,000 men of influence 
to one man of power," he said. 



202 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

" I saw in the newspapers the acconnt of the death of a 'suc- 
cessful' business man. He died wealthy, and left two drunken 
sons. 

" It doesn't pay to be a worldly Christian. Stay in the world 
or get out of it. A man once said his well was good with two 
exceptions — in the winter it froze up and in the summer it dried 
up. That is just the way with some Christians. They are either 
frozen or dried. 

"God hates a vacuum ; that is an old saying. But, friends, 
you can't empty the human heart. 

"You can't bail darkness out of anything. The easiest way 
to get rid of it is to let the light in. 

" Oh, man, get down if you want to get up." 

Once he said solemnly : "Do you people believe that Jesus 
can be found here to-night ?" 

A voice far out on that human lake came floating to the stage. 
" Yes, sir," it said, very firmly. 

"Do you ministers believe that Jesus can be found here 
to-night ?" 

The ministers on the stage below Mr. Moody answered in 
chorus : " Yes, sir, we do." 

" Does this choir around me believe Jesus can be found here 
to-night?" 

"Yes, sir," answered the choir. 

"Then find Him !" thundered Mr. Moody. 

WHO WILL TRUST IN THE LORD? 

Again Mr. Moody made a long pause. Then he asked : "Will 
some one say, 'I will trust in the Lord to-night and not be afraid?' 
Will some one say simply, ' I will ! ' The door hangs on the hinge. 
Will you push open the door and let Christ in ? Will you ? Will 
you ?" 

He stopped and waited, eagerly expecting a hearty response 
to his plain, personal question. 

The church was like a tomb, for no one would make a reply. 
At last a voice far back said : " I will." Mr. Moody breathed 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 203 

hard in his relief. ik I will," said another. The Evangelist smiled. 
kk I will try," said another. 

ik What's that?" asked Mr.' Moody. 

k4 I will try," said the man. 

"Now listen, my friend," said Mr. Moody, tapping his Bible. 
"It is better to say, k I will,' than ' I will try.' If yon ' will ' yon 
purpose to succeed, if yon ' will try ' yon may make excuses for 
your failure." 

" I will," said the man. 

" Did you ever see a young man that had a little heaven in 
his home, a dear mother and sisters ? And he leaves home and 
gets into bad company and goes down, down, down?" 

Mr. Moody almost sank on his knees, his palms turned toward 
the platform. 

MUST HAVE HIS WHISKEY. 

"He cleans spittoons in a whisky shop. A friend finds him 
there and tells him his mother wants him. But he won't go. He 
says he must have his whisky. He don't wan't to go ! He won't 
go ! he says." 

Mr. Moody fairly screamed the words. 

"He — must — have — his — whisky !" A pause. 

" But God, if He will, can take that drunkard up, up, up " 
(Mr. Moody held both hands aloft), " above the cherubim." (He 
reached higher). "Above the seraphim. To His own white 
throne." 

A number of electric globes that had been dark suddenly 
glowed with light. Mr. Moody, ever artful, took advantage of the 
illustration. " They are turning on the lights. I wish God would 
turn on His lights in your hearts." 

Near the close of one service, Mr. Moody leaned on the organ 
and asked the ministers : "Will you ministers allow me to say a 
word to you ?" 

" Yes, yes, say what you want," they answered. 

" Well, I'm not a prophet, but I have a guess to make that I 
think will prove a true prophecy. You hear so much nowadays 



204 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY 

about the preacher of the twentieth century. Do you know what 
sort of a man that will be ? He will be the sort of a preacher who 
opens his Bible and preaches out of that. 

FULLER ACCOUNT OF MEETINGS IN KANSAS CITY 

The remarkable scene depicted in the foregoing account of 
Mr. Moody's last meetings in Kansas City occurred on the second 
day of the series. The reader will be interested in a more detailed 
account of the beginning and progress of the last public services 
of the celebrated Evangelist. 

The Moody meetings began in Convention Hall, Kansas 
City, Sunday, November 12th. Two services were held, one in 
the afternoon at 2.30 o'clock, and one in the evening at 7.30 
o'clock. There were such crowds at both meetings that the doors 
had to be closed before Mr. Mood}^ began preaching, to keep the 
people from filling the aisles. At each meeting at least 12,000 
persons were in the hall. At the afternoon service 1,000 persons 
stood outside the building, and at the evening service about 1,500 
vainly asked for admission. 

GREAT THRONG OUTSIDE. 

The doorkeepers were fearful lest the crowd outside should 
burst in on them, and carefully guarded the bolted entrances. What 
part of those outside did not disperse, held an overflow meeting 
in the Second Presb3^terian church across the street. It was never 
before necessary to deny admission to so many to Convention 
Hall. 

The preaching of Mr. Moody was an attraction that brought 
crowds from out of town, and there were many strange faces in the 
hall. Church people made up the bulk of the audience, and the 
gray hair of venerable old men and women could be seen dotting 
the crowd. The seats were close together. The people were 
packed tight. The heads mounted from the arena floor to the 
rafters at the top of the second balcony. No one was admitted 
to the roof garden for fear of the noise. 

When it is considered that Mr. Moody preached on the first 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 205 

day to 24,000 persons, and that these two meetings were the first 
of a contemplated series of sixteen, one may get an idea of the 
vastness of his probable effect on Kansas City and the towns of 
the West that sent a part of their population to hear him, had he 
been able to continue his work. There is little donbt that he 
would have filled the hall fourteen times more. If he had done 
so he would have addressed 192,000 persons, almost the entire 
population of Kansas City. It must be remembered, though, 
that Mr. Moody would have bad the same persons to speak to 
several times. 

A CHORUS OF 550 VOICES. 

Mr. Moody was to preach two sermons a day, one at 3 o'clock 
and one at 8 o'clock, all the week and the following Sunday. He 
succeeded on the first day in controlling his hearers and keeping 
them quiet. It required 125 ushers to seat the audience ; a choir 
of 550 voices was necessary to sing the hymns. But Mr. Moody, 
throwing out his powerful, far-reaching voice, made his passionate 
utterances felt to the remotest parts of that vast building. During 
his first sermon he affected powerfully his audience. Mr. Moody 
began his conquest in the afternoon and he looked for great victo- 
ries before the eight days of his preaching were over. 

The famous hall has been described before when the audience 
filled it from the second balcony to the arena, but it never before 
appeared as it did in the afternoon and the evening of that Sun- 
day. The audience was more dense, more subdued, more self- 
controlled. It came to see and hear a great man. It came to be 
amused and to be moved. 

This is the way, Mr. Moody conducted the meeting : At 
2.45 o'clock he stood up. " Let us bow our heads in prayer," he 
said; and the twelve thousand heads were bowed. Mr. Moody 
sat down and Dr. Northrop made the prayer. While the prayer 
went out, a few cast their eyes on the Evangelist to note how he 
prayed. He sat far back in his chair with his back well braced 
and his huge bulk cramped in the narrow space of the seat. He 
wore a plain business suit of dark, striped material, and a high 



206 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

vest buttoned nearly to his chin. His head was down and his gray 
beard hid the black necktie. One plump hand rested on the arm 
of his chair; with the left hand he solemnly stroked his face 
and beard in a rythmical movement. 

The hand went up to his forehead and as the sentences 
flowed along the hand crept down over the features and to the end 
of his beard, keeping time in a rough sort of way to Dr. 
Northrop' s sentences. His eyes were closed, his jaws set, the 
expression of his countenance was one of rapt and solemn atten- 
tion. The lines in his face never moved of their own volition, his 
cheeks never quivered, but his plump hand went on stroking 

his face. 

A TOMB-LIKE SILENCE. 

The prayer ended and again Mr. Moody got up. " Let us 
now have silent prayer," he said. There were 48,000 hands and 
feet in that hall that Mr. Moody had to overcome, and among 
them were the hands and feet of many children. But he won 
his first victory. A silence as of God fell swiftly on that multitude. 
It was a silence of gradations : First of all the whispering ceased; 
then the hands that were making motions fell to the laps and the 
feet ceased moving about and the heads were bowed. The ushers 
stopped stock still. The sounds on the street seemed to stop as 
if the city were paralyzed. The children, appalled at such a 
silence, were silent, too. 

It was as if a miracle were about to happen in every heart. 
The hush approached a perfect tomb-like silence. Twelve 
thousand persons in a hall and not an audible noise to be heard ! 

The scene and the situation were both profound and awe-full. 
Mr. Moody stood on the stage and listened and prayed in 
silence. The people prayed with hirn also in silence. It 
was the most impressive space of time during all the meeting. 
The silence lasted for one, two, three minutes. It was a terrible 
strain. One could feel it, it was so deep. When it seemed it 
could last no longer, that something would burst, if the 
people were not abruptly awakened, Mr. Moody lifted his head 
and with that movement the spell was broken. " Bishop Hendrix 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 207 

will lead us in prayer," said Mr. Moody. "Breathe upon ns, O 
Lord — " began the Bishop. 

There were 550 voices on the stage, selected from all the 
churches of the two Kansas Cities. Prof. C. C. Case of Chicago 
led them, a little organ piped out its notes and a young woman 
played the cornet. The quartette sang " When Shining Stars 
Their Vigil Keep," Prof. Case sang "Throw Out the Life Line," 
and Mr. Moody stood up to preach. 

Hymn sheets had been distributed about the building, one 
on every seat, and Mr. Moody was afraid of the noise they might 
make. So he asked, 'in a moderate tone, " Will everybody that has 
a hymn sheet hold it up ? " This was also to try the effect of his 
voice. Almost instantly the sheets went up above the heads all 
over the hall, and then Mr. Moody said, "Now shake them." 

SOWING AND REAPING. 

The sound that these flimsy sheets of paper made was inde- 
scribably musical. There is nothing to compare it with ; one can 
only say it was a vast rustle. 

"All right," shouted Mr. Moody ; "now you will please sit 
on them." And the people sat on them. Having taken this pre- 
caution against interruption, Mr. Moody began his sermon. 

" In after years, as you go by this building. I want you to 
remember this text which I am about to read to you. I pray that 
God will write it on every heart. It appeals to men and women 
of all sorts and conditions, to the priests and ministers and to the 
reporters. My text is this : ' Be not deceived ; God is not mocked ; 
.for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.' " 

From these words Mr. Moody preached a powerful discourse, 
pointed, terse, earnest, full of his striking characteristics, by which 
the audience was deeply impressed. The same profound impres- 
sion was produced by all the subsequent meetings. Convention 
hall was filled to overflowing, and hundreds after the meetings 
were over went into the inquiry room for instruction. 

On the evening of November 15th, Mr. Moody appeared 
much exhausted. He seemed to come closer to his immense 



208 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

audience tha7i he had since the meetings began. He controlled 
his hearers. Times were when the 12,000 seemed to be wiping 
their eyes at once ; times were when they laughed at once. To 
hear 12,000 laugh simultaneously in a hall is a sound to marvel 
at. But the immense audience laughed and wept as if by common 
impulses. 

'• I think I got pretty close to you last night," said Mr. 
Moody. "I've noticed that when a hush comes over an audience 
and all seem to be listening, that God is moving it." 

GOD'S HELP IS ALWAYS AT HAND. 

" God always helps those who wish His help. It is those people 
who follow Christ for what they can get out of Him and not for 
what He is that are disappointed. If this audience could be sifted 
tonight we would find some strange reasons for its coming here. 
There's a man in the gallery who came here just to see such a 
crowd as we have tonight. Well, I'm glad you came anyhow. 
Maybe Christ will touch your heart and you'll have another rea- 
son for coming next time. There's a man who came to please his 
wife, and there's a man who came just to have it to say that he 
attended such a big revival meeting. There's another man who 
came just because he hadn't anything else to do. But I believe 
there are persons who came here, saying, 'we will see Jesus.' I never 
saw a man earnest about his soul who did not get to heaven." 

With this introduction Mr. Moody began his sermon. He 
looked exhausted and his face was flushed and sweating. But the 
inspiration of such an audience sustained him. 

The following is from the pen of Mr. Sankey. He entitles it 
" Reminiscences of Sacred Song ": 

"In the month of June, 1871, I was sent as a delegate from 
the Young Men's Christian Association of New Castle, Pa., to an 
International Convention of the Association, held in the city of 
Indianapolis, Ind. This event proved to be a turning point in my 
life, as I there met a number of the most prominent Christian 
workers of that day, among whom was Mr. Moody, a delegate from 
the Chicago Association. The convention was one of great inter- 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 209 

est to me, as I had been engaged to some extent in Christian work 
among the young men of my native State. 

ik The singing was, from my point of view, one of the most 
interesting features of the convention. It was conducted from the 
platform by William H. Doane and H. Thane Miller, without the 
choir. I was especially pleased to see and hear M. Doane, as I 
had been singing many of his sacred songs in my Sunday-school 
and church, such as ' Tell me the Old, Old Story,' 'Safe in the 
Arms of Jesus,' ' Pass me not, O Gentle Saviour,' etc. Mr. 
Miller acted as precenter, Mr. Doane presiding at a small cabinet 
organ. 

POWER OF SACRED SONG. 

"Several times during each session these gentlemen were 
requested to sing certain pieces, either as a solo or duet. I was 
quick to observe the great interest taken by the entire convention 
in this part of the service. No sooner was a song announced to be 
sung by Mr. Miller, than the audience became so quiet that one 
could almost hear the clock ticking. Especially was this so when 
the hymn entitled 'The Prodigal Child,' the music for which was 
written by Mr. Doane, was given out. The first stanza was as 

follows : 

" Come home ! Come home ! 
You are weary at heart, 
For the way has been dark, 
And so lonely and wild ; 
O prodigal child ! 
Come home ! oh, come home ! 

: 'The rendering of this song was a revelation to me of the 
marvelous power there was in a simple gospel hymn when the 
singer put his whole heart and soul into it. I shall never forget 
how the great gathering was thrilled by the wonderful pathos of 
the singer's voice. It was an entirely different style of singing 
from that which I had so often heard in many churches where I 
attended. Every word could be distinctly heard in the remotest 
part of the building, and all present seemed to feel the marvelous 
power of the song. For a moment no one seemed willing to break 

14 



210 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

the deep silence that prevailed when the hymn was ended. I 
looked about to see if I had been the only one moved to tears, but 
found I was not alone. Many near me had been deeply touched 
by the exquisite rendering of the new song. 

" It was while under the influence of this hymn that there first 
arose a great desire in my own heart that I might some day be 
able to use my voice in like manner. 

APPEALS MADE BY HYMNS. 

"In Chicago, six months later, I was seated with Mr. Moody 
on the large stage or platform of Farwell Hall, before an immense 
audience, to whom he was about to preach on 'The Prodigal Son.' 
He turned to me and said : ' When I get through speaking, I want you 
to sing alone the song we heard in Indianapolis, "The Prodigal 
Child." ' I replied, ' I hardly think I can do so, as I have no organ 
with which to accompany myself.' Pointing over his shoulder to 
the large $3,000 organ in the rear of the platform, he said : ' Isn't 
that organ enough for you ?' I replied that it was too large, and 
that if I attempted to use it I would have to turn my back to the 
audience, and I did not feel that I could sing in that way any more 
than he could preach under like conditions. 

"He felt the force of what I said, and it was agreed that I 
should sing the hymn without an organ accompaniment, which I 
did with fear and trembling. At the close of the last verse — 



" Come home ! come home ! 
There is bread and to spare, 
And a warm welcome there ! 

Then to friends reconciled, 

O prodigal child ! 
Come home ! oh, come home ! 






Mr. Moody arose and said : ' If there are any here to-night who 
have a desire to turn away from sin and come home to the Father's 
house, if they will rise to their feet I will be glad to pray for 
them.' Over one hundred men responded to the invitation, and 
stood up. I had never witnessed such power in a meeting before. 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 211 

This was my first solo in Mr. Moody's evangelistic meetings, and 
it became one of the most useful hymns in our subsequent work. 

"On our arrival in England, in 1873, we began evangelistic 
meetings in the city of York. At each meeting a number of sacred 
solos were sung, including the * Prodigal Child,' and for many 
months no single hymn was more blessed to the return of prodi- 
gals than this one. At one of the towns visited in the north of 
England, a young man arose in the meeting while I was singing 
this song, rushed down the aisle of the church, and throwing his 
arms around the neck of his father, from whom he had long been 
estranged, said : 'O my father, will you forgive me ?' The father 
was not a professing Christian, but replied : ' Yes, my boy, I 
freely forgive you. Now let us go into the inquiry room and ask 
God to forgive us both.' They went arm in arm into the vestry 
of the church, followed by a score or more of penitents, who had 
been touched by the reconciliation of the father and son. 

URGENT REQUESTS FOR PRAYER. 

" While in Scotland we received many letters in regard to the 
use of hymns, one of which was from a Christian mother who had 
long been praying for her sailor boy. He had gone away from, 
home, taking with him the little Bible in which she had marked 
some special verses and written his name. But, as is so often the 
case, the boy soon forgot his mother's prayers, and then his Bible 
was cast aside. He became the boon companion of evil men. 

" The letter went on to tell how the boy had gone to one 01' 
our meetings in Glasgow through curiosity, but had been so 
touched by the lines, ' Come home, O prodigal child, come home,' 
as sung at the close of the address, that he went into the inquiry 
meeting, and, while being spoken to by a faithful minister of the 
Gospel, decided for Christ, and at once wrote home to his mother 
of the change in his life. Scores iof like incidents occurred during 
the six months we spent in Scotland. 

" I shall never forget how the Spirit of God used this , c ,ong at 
the close of one of our meetings in Agricultural Hall, London, in 
1875. The service was for men only, and had been arranged for 



212 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

under the auspices of the Young Men's Christian Association. 
Tickets of admission had been distributed in the leading factories 
and business houses of the city, and an audience of something 
over seventeen thousand men was present, this being the largest 
indoor service we ever held. William E. Gladstone, Lord Kin- 
naird and other distinguished persons were present, and occupied 
seats on the platform. 

"Immediately at the close of Mr. Moody's address he asked 
the audience to bow their heads in silent prayer while a solo would 
be sung. He then requested me to sing 'The Prodigal Child.' I 
felt deeply the responsibility of having such a service, at so criti- 
cal a moment, transferred from the preacher to the singer, even 
for the few seconds required to sing the song. However seeing 
the multitude bowing their heads, and observing the hush that 
fell upon the meeting, I was encouraged to go forward, leaning 
upon the arm of Him who said, ' I will never leave thee, nor for- 
sake thee.' 

FAMOUS SONG WRITER. 

" The song was followed by an earnest prayer, and not less 
than two thousand men, by invitation of Mr. Moody, went into the 
large galleries of the building for consultation and prayer. In 
those days many persons professed to have accepted Christ as their 
Saviour during the singing of this and other Gospel songs. The 
author of the song, Mrs. Ellen M Huntington Gates, now living 
in East Orange, N. J., has written several other hymns which have 
been much used in our work. 

"Among them may be mentioned, 'The Home of the Soul,' 
'Eternity,' and 'Your Mission.' The latter was sung by Philip 
Phillips at a great gathering of the Christian Commission in 
Washington, D. C, at the beginning of our Civil War. Abraham 
Lincoln was present on this occasion, and was so impressed with 
the song that he requested the chairman, Hon. William H. Sew- 
ard, to have it repeated. 

" I have no doubt that the singing of such songs as I have 
mentioned by Mr. Phillips, Mr. Miller, Mr. Doane, Mr. Bliss 
and others, has been the means of leading thousands of young 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 213 

men into the service of Christ. I wish to pay this small tribute 
of gratitude to those who in days long gone by were so helpful to 
me in beginning my mission of sacred song. 

"Twenty years after hearing Mr. Miller sing in Indianapolis, 
it was my pleasure to meet him again in a similar convention in 
Philadelphia. One pleasant afternoon we went to the home of our 
old friend and co-laborer, Hon. George H. Stuart, who was con- 
fined to his room by a mortal illness. He was glad to see us for a 
few moments, and before we departed the dying man asked us to 
sing for him his favorite hymn, ' Jesus, Saviour, Pilot Me.' Mr. 
Miller sang with all his old-time sweetness and power, and received 
the hearty thanks of the one who was so soon to breast the dark 
waters of Jordan. 

MOODY'S FAVORITE TEXT. 

" Mr. Miller, too, has passed 'over life's tempestuous sea,' 
and entered the rest prepared for the people of God. The influence 
of his consecrated life and splendid voice still remains as a bene- 
diction upon all who knew him in the house of his earthly pil- 
grimage." 

Mr. Moody was familiar with every part of the Bible, but there 
were certain passages that were particularly adapted to his work, 
and these he used over and over again, preaching from them scores 
of times and illustrating them in every possible way. His favor- 
ite text was in the 91st Psalm. In order that the reader may see 
this remarkable passage and the connection in which it stands, 
we here insert the page of the Bible which contains it. 

This favorite text of Mr, Moody embraces the 14th and 15th 
verses of the Psalm, and is as follows : " Because he hath set his 
love upon me, therefore will I deliver him : I will set him on high, 
because he hath known my name. 

u He shall call upon me, and I will answer him : I will be with 
him in trouble ; I will deliver him and honor him. 

Of Mr. Moody, Rev. Dr. Weston, of Crozer Theological Sem- 
inary, says : 

" You ask me for my impressions of Mr. Moody. To me he 



The security of the godly. PSALMS, XCI. An exhortation to praise God 



g Job 14. 2. 
Ps. 92. 7. 



h Ps. 50. 21. 
Jer. 16. 17. 



6 s'ln the morning it flourisheth, 
and groweth up ; in the evening it 
is cut down, and withereth. 

7 For we are consumed ru by thine 
anger, and rv bj thy wrath are we 
troubled. 

8 h Thou hast set our iniquities be- 
fore thee, our * secret sins in the ,i p s- 19.12. 
light of thy countenance. 

9 For all our days are u passed away j n Heb. f urn- 

• x-l j.-u rv j edaway. 

m thy wrath: we rv spend our years! 

rv 12 as a tale that is told. ^itauon. 

10 lo The days of our years are three- *J ^? b - J As 

j j. //• j -^ i. for the days 

score years and ten ; ? ' and if by rea- 
son of strength ro they be fourscore 
years, yet is their rv strength labour 
and sorrow ; for it is soon ru cut off, 
and we fly away. 

11 Who knoweth the power of 
thine anger? rv even according to thy 
fear, so is thy wrath. 

12 * So teach us to number our days, 
that we may™ 2 apply our hearts 2 t ^;^ ause 

UntO Wisdom. 1 1 Deut. 32. 36. 

13 Return, O Lord, howlong? andwips.'so. 6'; 
let it l repent thee concerning thy|^^S> .3 .a 



of our yea, 
in them are 
seventy 
years. 



k Ps. 39. 4. 



o Ps. 27. 4. 
p Is. 26. 12. 



servants. 

14 O satisfy us rv early with thy 
mercy ; m that we may rejoice and be "^ 
glad all our days. 3 Heb. lodge. 

15 Make us glad according to the b c 12.' i42. 8 5. 
days wherein thouhast afflicted us, and d e |J; \2\ ?• 
the years wherein we have seen evil. 5 y V^J- 

16 Let n thy work appear unto thy &c. 
servants, and thy glory ru unto their i f^' g 1 " 7; 
children. f™ : - 3 - s » 

17 ° And let the beauty of the Lord ' is. «. 2. 
our God be upon us : and -P establish I^Ejuls. 
thou the work of our hands 
us ; yea, the work of our hands es- 



*P° n ?Ps e n 2 3; 



tablish thou it. 



H 



E 



PSALM XCI. 

The happy state of the godly. 

a that dwelleth in the secret 



90 1 
/rProv.12.21. 

iPs.34.7; 71. 
3. 

Matt. 4. 6. 
Luke 4. 10, 
11. 
Heb. 1. 14. 

place of the most High shall 7 Ps JO £. 5 2 4 23 - 

f.Vip 1 4 Or, asp. 
me n Ps. 9. 10. 
o Ps. 50. 15. 

2 c I will say of the Lord, He is my Ji lam. 2. 30. 
refuge and my fortress : my God ; mj^JFj^f 1 ^ 
rv him will I trust. Pro v. 3. 2. 



3 abide b under 
Almighty. 



the shadow of 



3 rv Surely d he shall deliver thee aPs 147L 

n the snare of the fowl 
from the noisome pestilence. 



from the snare of the fowler, a^jj^ 8 ^ 1 ^ 



j nights. 



4 e He shall cover thee with his 
rv feathers, and under his wings shalt 
thou rv trust : his truth rv shall be thy 
shield and rv buckler. 

5 /Thou shalt not be afraid for the 
terror by night ; nor for the arrow 
that flieth by day ; 

I 6 ro Nor for the pestilence thatw&lk- 
jeth in darkness ; nor for the destruc- 
tion that wasteth at noonday. 

7 A thousand shall fall at thy 
side, and ten thousand at thy right 
hand ; but it shall not come nigh 
thee. 

8 Only with thine eyes shalt thou 
behold and see the reward of the 
wicked. 

9 rv Because thou hast made the 
Lord, which is h my refuge, even the 
most High, • thy habitation ; 

10 * There shall no evil befall thee, 
neither shall any plague come nigh 
[thy rv dwelling, 

I 11 z For he shall give his angels 
charge over thee, to keep thee in all 
ithy ways. 

I 12 They shall bear thee up in their 
hands, m lest thou dash thy foot 
against a stone. 

13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion 
and 4 adder : the young lion and the 
rv dragon shalt thou trample under 
feet. 

14 Because he hath set his love 
upon me, therefore will I deliver 
him : I will set him on high, because 
he hath n known my name. 

15 ° He shall call upon me, and I 
will answer him: PI will be with 
him in trouble; I will deliver him, 
and Q honour him. 

16 With 5 long life will I satisfy 
him, and shew him my salvation. 

PSALM xcn. 

The prophet exhorteth to praise God. 
A Psalm or Song for tbe sabbatb day. 

TT is a a good thing to give thanks 
•*- unto the Lord, and to sing 
praises unto thy name, O most 
High: 

2 To 6 shew forth thy lovingkind- 
ness in the morning, and thy faith- 
fulness 6 every night, 



XC. 7 in— in thy 9 bring— to an end as 10 Or 
even by— (they be)— pride but labour— gone, and 
11 And thy wrath according to the fear that is due 
unto thee? 12 get us an heart of wisdom. 14 in 
the morning with 16 upon XCI. 2 whom I trust. 



3 For he shall 4 pinions.— take refuge :— is a— a 
6 (Nor) 9 For thou, O Lord, art my refuge ! Thou 
hast made the Most High thy habitation ; 10 tent. 
13 serpent 



2X4 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 215 

was the greatest religious character of the century. His child- 
hood was passed under Unitarian preaching ; at his conversion to 
evangelical faith he gave so little promise of ability to use the 
English language that his pastor and other friends discouraged 
his attempt to take part in the religious meetings of the church ; 
he began to preach without any education ; I think he was never 
formally licensed or ordained, but he gradually widened his sphere 
of work and influence until for years in every city and State in 
the Union, in England, Scotland, and Ireland, he drew crowds 
limited only by the size of the buildings in which they were con- 
vened, and retained that power undiminished until the last hour 
of his life. 

"The number of his converts I do not dare to estimate. His 
death will be followed by a universal eulogy unprecedented on this 
continent, for while men have sometimes criticised his methods, 
no stain has ever sullied his character or reputation, no friend has 
ever regretted any unfortunate trait in his dealings with mankind ; 
he has lived in the public eye most conspicuously these many 
years and no word of reproach has ever been spoken against him. 

HIS OLD NEIGHBORS AND FRIENDS. 

'' In the summer conferences at Northfield, the place of his 
residence, the announcement of no preacher's name, American, 
English, or Scotch would draw such a crowd from all the sur- 
rounding country as would Mr. Moody's. His neighbors and 
acquaintances believed in him. 

"Among the many unique things in this man's life was the 
class of persons whose lives were shaded and moulded by him. 
Before Mr. Moody's great meetings in Philadelphia I was repeat- 
edly told, 'he will lay hold of a class of persons whom you preach- 
ers cannot reach.' I fully expected this ; but was very much sur- 
prised to find that all the persons converted in that meeting who 
came under my observation were from what would be considered 
the religiously educated and cultured class of the community. 

" And when afterward I became more fully acquainted with 
his life and method I was greatly interested in the laymen who 



216 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

came to Christ tinder his ministry, and specially with those whom he 
bronght into immediate relation with his work ; men of broad views, 
of judgment, skill, energy and success. And then remember what 
men in Edinburgh, Oxford and elsewhere were converted under 
his preaching, remember those who received a new impulse in the 
Christian life, who are now preaching the Gospel in various parts 
of the earth or have preceded him in the entrance of another world. 

"In all other instances of eminent success in the work of 
preaching men, find explanation of that success in the person of 
the preacher, in some natural gift or endowment, in some special 
training or education, in personal magnetism : Mr. Moody had 
none of these ; what had he ? 

"It is evident that there were in him latent great powers of 
nature. What developed them into that surpassing ability b}^ which 
he achieved his triumphs ? 

SUMMED UP IN ONE WORD. 

" There is but one word that has ever occurred to me in this 
connection, and that word is life — not the way of living — but what 
Christ means when he says, ' I am come that they may have life.' 
God gave Mr. Moody that life, made him partaker of the Divine 
nature, and to the development and manifestation of that life, Mr. 
Mood}^ gave from the beginning every energ3 r of his soul. 

"This life was nourished by continual feeding on the Word 
of God. It was his meditation day and night. He hid God's Word 
in his heart. To the Bible he went continual^ with the spirit cf 
a little child. He studied the Bible that he might transmute it 
into life. He went to it not from curiosity, not to increase his 
knowledge, not to make a system of theology ; he wanted to know 
what he might do. He lived for others. His first desire was that 
others might have the life which he had received ; then, that they 
might have the means of developing that life, that poor boys and girls 
might receive that help by which they could fit themselves for 
lives of usefulness. His whole work was in accordance with 
Christ's miracles, who never bestowed bounties on those whom he 
benefitted, but always the means of performing the functions of 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 217 

life. Life is always joy. He had the constant companion of full 
and abundant life — joy. It was a feature that constantly mani- 
fested itself, pervading his whole being in a way that many a time 
was evidently unconscious to himself." 

The following is from a well known layman, Mr. Henry C. 
Mabie, of Boston : 

" With great pleasure I testify to my very high esteem of the 
native qualities, the large endowments, and the Christian grace 
and practical wisdom in the affairs of Christ's kingdom which 
characterized Mr. Moody. He was of course sui generis, abso- 
lutely so. He was, on the whole, perhaps, the most original pro- 
duct of the Christian religion which the past generation has afforded. 
He started, indeed, with an uncommonly strong physical constitu- 
tion, with native shrewdness, enthusiasm and power to organize, but 
I think the large practical wisdom and general balance of common 
sense, which has so characterized him in recent years, was a result 
of the grace of God upon his life and the contact which that grace 
afforded him with large-minded and able men on both sides of the 
sea; particularly after Mr. Moody's return from the first cam- 
paign in great Britain with Sankey, he at once gave evidence of a 
greatly sobered character. 

LOOKED WELL BEFORE HE LEAPED. 

"His extraordinary power over assemblies of conservative men 
was never so conspicuous until then. The truth is he had come 
in contact in Great Britain with men of lofty type, particularly in 
Edinburgh and other Scotch towns, as well as in England ; and 
the conservative spirit of those lands had its effect upon him. He 
more and more, toward the end of his life, placed emphasis upon 
the value of the Church as an organized institution, and he had 
less and less tendency to initiate movements of marked divergence 
from those approved by the most conservative judgment of the 
churches, broadly speaking. 

" His insight into the Bible was the result of the closest sort 
of personal study of it, together with a teachableness of spirit 
which led him to take for his models in preaching some of the 



218 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

most imaginative and gifted of the Scotch preachers, particularly 
the Bonar brothers. His power to appeal to the religious imagi- 
nation was a distinct development of his later years and of his con- 
tact with British worthies. He was always ready to take the master, 
in any department of thought or activity, and study him until he 
had gotten the secret of his power ; and he was always a humble 
man. 

GREAT INFLUENCE OVER STUDENTS. 

" The motives he put upon education and school work, and 
his power to command the student bodies of the colleges of this 
country, was something entirely unparalled by any other man of 
his time. The presidents of great institutions, like Yale and 
Princeton and numberless others, including our best theological 
seminaries everywhere, who found themselves year by year in 
his various conferences at Northfield, were glad to sit at his feet, 
and I think unvaryingly left his presence with the realization that 
they had been face to face with one of the most extraordinary 
Christian products of their generation. " 

There is a tradition that a negro woman lay dying at night 
in a Chicago garret. Solicitude concerning the future of her lit- 
tle child mingled with her sensation of pain and with her solemn 
thoughts as she stood upon the verge of the great change which 
comes once to every human being. An earnest, humble follower 
of Christ sat in a chair by the bedside. One of his arms encircled 
the dying woman's child which sat upon the white man's knee, 
the hand of that arm grasping a candle whose feeble rays illumined 
the pages of a well-worn Bible. 

The other hand held the sacred volume, from whose pages the 
reader pronounced aloud to the negro mother the words of ever- 
lasting life. The woman's face kindled with hope, while the inno- 
cent child gazed wonderingly into the face of him whose voice in 
coming years was to speak to great multitudes of people, who, 
like the pathetic dying negro mother, and like the wise men 
of the East and the shepherds on the plains of Bethlehem, 
inquired concerning Him of whom Moses and the prophets did 
write. 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 210 

God had cast a permanent shadow upon the faces of mother 
and child, and on that night the flickering candle left the face of 
the godly reader in a temporary shadow wherein his closest friend 
might not be sure of the reader's identity. That man, since he 
issued from that humble garret, on that undated evening, has 
stood upon the platforms of three continents, preaching to hun- 
dreds of thousands the substance of the same simple Gospel that 
pointed out to the negro mother the way of salvation. 

That garret scene may, or may not have been put upon can- 
vas, or it may simply have lurked, as a picture, in the mind of 
this writer. Moody, whether reading at that altar-like bedside or 
standing on vividly-lighted platforms in the presence of thrice five 
thousands of people, was the same man and Evangelist. His 
ministry to the dying negro mother must have been of the nature 
of an apostolic ordination whose laying on of hands gave him 
power to command the hearts of vast multitudes who never tired 
of hearing God's message from lips touched that night by a coal 
of holy fire glowing on God's altar. 

GRANDER THAN ANY KING. 

Dare one hazard the mention of a public man the news of 
whose death would stir the hearts of as many human beings ? 
What king, or queen, or emperor, or president, by force of that 
which relates alone to personal service, can command a greater 
throng to join the long procession that marches behind the 
grieving funeral column that escorts Moody to his triumphant 
burial ? 

In the strict sense, uneducated ; unsupported in earlier life by 
influential friends ; plain in personal presence ; untaught in the 
arts of public speech ; vocally strident and insistent to the point 
whereat his tones tempted one to challenge the apparently over- 
confident speaker ; without the ornaments of rhetoric, sometimes 
in the very midst of a fervid passage so ungrammatical that the 
purist hearer fairly squirmed in his chair ; informal to the last 
limit of toleration ; abrupt ; confident as to his message as if he 
would brook no human questioning — he yet for years commanded 



220 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

such throngs that it is well-nigh impossible to name another who 
has addressed so many hearers. How shall one try to name the 
secret of his power ? Whatever that secret, he held the throngs 
close np to the moment of his departure from earth. 

Mr. Moody believed in his message and in the authority of 
him who shaped the message. He read from the Scripture as if 
he had been in the presence of God when He spake the sacred 
words. As untaught in scholarly things as some may deem him, 
he shamed the scholars in divine things, when he is measured by 
the intent according to which God commits His Word to schooled 
or unschooled human messengers. While the wiser debated as to 
the "Jehovistic" and the "Elohistic" documents as materials for 
the canon, he declared that he was content to preach persistently 
" the things in the Bible that everybody understands." 

ONE TEXT CONTAINS ENOUGH THEOLOGY. 

He smilingly, and yet with a damp eye, said that the verse 
" Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will 
give you rest" contains theology and religion enough for any man 
or woman upon earth. It was admirable, marvelous, and wonder- 
fully effective when Mr. Moody talked to five thousand people 
about the miracle whereby Jesus Christ gave sight to the blind 
man. He told of the two efficient conditions wherein a blind man, 
fairly groaning to be able to see, met the Christ whose power to 
help a human being was equaled only by his glowing desire to help 
any soul that really longs to be healed. Moody would approach 
that narrative about which tens and tens of thousands of preachers 
have discoursed, and talk about it, and urge it and rejoice in it and 
recount it as if he were the first and only preacher who ever gave 
its substance to human hearers. 

Without the orator's graces, without the simplest elements 
employed bv an artist, without any of the artist's instincts, with- 
out any disturbing and subduing suspicion that he was in danger 
of reminding a hearer of a trite thing, and, above all, without a 
doubt that he was preaching that which no hearer would regard 
as trite, Mr. Moody fairly entranced his multitude with the nevei 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 



221 



dying, always old and ever new power of that which God com- 
manded to be written for all men in all ages subsequent to the 
undying record. 

Moody lived near to God, and God never failed to be near to 
his unsophisti- 
cated Evangel- 
ist, whenever 
and wherever 
and nnder what- 
soever circum- 
stances he told 
"the old, old 
story of Jesus 
and his love." 
He talked to ten 
thousand just as 
he talked to the 
intent, humble, 
longing, dying 
negro woman in 
the Chicago gar- 
ret. 

He thought 
of, studied, 
preached, fed 
upon, was nour- 
ished by and 
believed in the 
whole Bible as 
if it all were as 
plain, unques- 
tionable, simple, 

and easily understood as the one verse: "Come unto Me, 
all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 
It might have been well if Mr. Moody had had more of the 
learning of the schools. It would be very well, indeed, if all the 




DWIGHT L. MOODY 

AS HE APPEARED AT THE AGE OF 56. 



222 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

schools could do their work and indict their volumes within the. 
sacred and reverent atmosphere that enveloped Dwight L. Moody 
when he dealt with the human soul that sought after God. 

Among the many religious revivals conducted by the great 
Evangelist the largest crowd he ever addressed at an indoor meet- 
ing was during his first campaign in Great Britain. It was at this 
meeting also that Mr. Moody made what he considered his most 
remarkable conversion. The meeting was in Agricultural Hall, 
London, and over 15,000 persons were in attendance. When asked 
about this conversion he said several years ago : 

A REMARKABLE CONVERSION. 

" The man was an English race horse owner. He was devoted 
to the track in all that that implies, and had been for the biggest 
part of his life. He was third owner of the Epsom race track, and 
a well-known character in sporting circles. He came to the meet- 
ing out of curiosity, but his heart was changed before it closed. 
He became a Christian, gave up his sporting connections, sold his 
horses and all his racing interests, and thereafter lived an exem- 
plary Christian life. He had several sons, all of whom are earnest 
Christian workers. 

"This was a remarkable case, but there may have been others 
to equal it, although the change does not stand out in such strong 
contrast. I have always felt that I have been well repaid for my 
life's work if I had accomplished no more than the saving of that 
man." 

The love of man was as permanent in Mr. Moody's life as 
the love of God was in his preaching. At no time in his career 
was he too busy to stop and lend a ready ear to the plaint of some 
seeker, no matter how lowly, whether he was after creature com- 
forts or spiritual assistance. No man of his time, it has been said 
by a noted divine, did "so much to unite man with man, break 
down grudges and sectarian barriers, harmonize diverse views and 
dispositions and raise money for other people's enterprises." 

Mr. Moody was a man of decisive action. When he conceived 
that a thing should be done he went at it heart and soul, and never 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 223 

rested until the end was accomplished. An incident which illus- 
trates this point of his character occurred during his first evan- 
gelistic tour of Great Britain. 

He was speaking in Liverpool, when one of the preachers who 
spoke declared the chief needs of Liverpool were cheap refresh- 
ment houses to counteract the evils of saloons. When the speaker 
finished Mr. Moody begged him to go on for ten minutes longer. 
Meanwhile he was busy whispering with some of the prominent 
citizens on the platform. 

At the end of the ten minutes Mr. Moody came forward and 
announced that a company had been formed to carry out this very 
object. The stock was subscribed on the spot, and the "British 
Workmen Company, Limited," was thus formed. It is still in 
existence, and has done a vast amount of good, and has, incidentally, 
paid divideuds almost from the start. 

TAKING SURE AIM. 

Much has been said about Mr. Moody singling out one per- 
son in his audience and preaching directly to him, until by his 
magnetism and eloquence the desired result was accomplished. 
When asked about this Mr. Moody said recently : 

•' Sometimes I see a man or a woman who is plainly having a 
struggle, who has been touched but not quite convinced. Then I 
try to say something that will appeal directly to that person. Any 
man who is accustomed to speaking from a platform knows whether 
or not he is carrying his audience with him. Sometimes I have 
had unexpected success in that way, and sometimes there has been 
a discouraging coldness. But I believe there is always a way to 
a man's heart if only you can find it." 

When asked once as to the best receipt for the success of 
young men, Mr. Moody said: "Singleness of purpose, whole- 
hearted work, concentration. Take St. Paul as your example. He 
was, I think, the model for all Christian workers — fearless, single- 
hearted, the most heroic figure in all history. There is no better 
motto for a young man to hold up before him than that one line 
from the Bible which runs, 'This one thing will I do,' and then he 



224 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

wants to pitch in and do with, all his might, and never let np nntil 

it is done. 

"No great thing was ever accomplished by half-hearted work. 

No man is big enongh to do a lot of things and to do them well 

enongh to last. When yon take him and spread him over a lot of 

surface he makes a layer too thin to form any impression. But if 

you take him and hammer him down with the sledge of some 

weighty purpose, even if there isn't more than enough of him to 

more than fill a bean-shooter, he'll make an impression when he 

strikes." 

During the month of November, 1899, Mr. Moody was holding 

great meetings in Kansas City. The fires in his soul seemed to 

burn more fiercely than ever before, as if he had a premonition 

that he was doing his last work, and would soon end his earthly 

career. He seemed to be a thousand men in one. Such earnest 

appeals, such powerful discourses, such resistless enthusiasm and 

energetic leadership, aroused the whole city and surrounding 

country. 

LAST SERMON HE EVER PREACHED. 

The great Convention Hall, capable of holding many thous- 
ands, was secured for the services, and here, day after day, 
immense throngs assembled and hung with breathless attention 
upon the lips of the great Evangelist. But the majestic cedar was 
tottering to its fall, and the brilliant light that shone over both 
hemispheres was destined soon to go out. The cause of death was 
a general breaking down, due to overwork, which affected the 
heart. Mr. Moody's heart had been weak for a long time. 

He preached his last sermon in Kansas City on Thursday 
night, November 16, fully fifteen thousand people listening to an 
earnest appeal. He was stricken the next morning at his hotel, 
but laughingly declared he was all right, and that he would be 
able to preach that afternoon. He grew worse gradually, how- 
ever, and it was deemed best to start him for his home the next 
day in a special train. Message n were sent to his home at North- 
field, and his wife and son started to meet him. The trains passed 
each other, and Mr. Moody reached Northfield first. Eminent 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 225 

physicians were consulted by Dr. N. P. Wood, the Moody family 
doctor, and everything was done to prolong life, but he was 
beyond hum an help. 

With the words " God is calling me," Mr. Moody fell asleep 
in death at his home at Northfield at noon on December 22nd. The 
passing of his spirit, from a body which had been tortured with 
pain for some weeks, to the rest beyond was as gentle as could be 
wished for. His family were gathered at the bedside, and the 
dying man's last moments were spent in comforting them and in 
contemplation of that reward for which he had so long and earn- 
estly labored. He knew 7 that death was near, but its sting to him 
was lost. Besides the family, there were present also Drs. Scho- 
field and Wood, and the nurse. 

Early in the day Mr. Moody realized that the end was not far 
off, and talked with his family at intervals, being conscious to the 
last, except for a few fainting spells. Once he revived, and, with 
wonderful display of strength in his voice, said in a happy strain : 

" What's the matter? What's going on here ?" 

One of the children replied : "Father, you have not been quite 
so well, and so we came in to see you." 

SOME OF HIS LAST WORDS. 

A little later Mr. Moody talked quite freely to his sons, say- 
ing : "I have always been an ambitious man, not ambitious to lay 
up wealth, but to leave you work to do ; and you are going to con- 
tinue the work of the schools at East Northfield and Mount Her- 
111011 and of the Chicago Bible Institute." 

Once the stillness of the chamber was broken by the anguished 
cry of Mrs. A. P. Fitt, his daughter, in the words : " Father, we 
can't spare you." The reply, so characteristic of the man, was : 
*' I am not going to throw my life away. If God has more work 
for me to do, I'll not die." 

As the noonday hour drew near the watchers at the bedside 
noted the approach of death. Several times his lips moved as if 
in prayer, but the articulation was so faint that the words could 
not be heard. Just as death came Mr. Moody awoke as if from 

15 



226 REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 

slumber, and said with much joyousness : "I see earth receding. 
Heaven is opening. God is calling me." 

The death of Mr. Moody was not unexpected, although hope 
for his temporary recovery from illness was entertained not only 
by friends near at hand, but by those who had listened to his word 
and teachings on both continents. In the family, however, there 
was fear that death was not a long way off. The cause of death 
was a general breaking down of his health, due to overwork. His 
constitution was that of an exceedingly strong man, but his untir- 
ing labors had gradually undermined his vitality, until that most 
delicate of organs, the heart, showed signs of weakness. His exer- 
tions in the West brought on the crisis, and the collapse came 
during the series of meetings at Kansas City. 

AN OMINOUS WEAKNESS. 

An early diagnosis by specialists made it evident that Mr, 
Moody's condition was serious, and, cancelling his engagements,, 
he returned to his home in East Northfield, so near the greatest 
achievements of his later life. On reaching his home the family 
physician, Dr. N. P. Wood, took charge of Mr. Moody, and for 
some days bulletins as to the patient's condition were issued, all 
having an encouraging tone seemingly, but unerringly pointing 
to the fact that the Evangelist's work on earth was about finished. 
A week before his death a change for the worse prepared immedi- 
ate friends for what was to come. 

Later, however, the patient improved steadily until the day 
before he died, when he appeared very nervous. This symptom was 
accompanied by weakness, which much depressed the family, who 
ware anxiously watching the sufferer. In the evening Mr. 
Moody appeared to realize that he could not recover, and so he 
informed his family. During the night the patient had spells 
of extreme weakness, and at two o'clock in the morning Dr. Wood 
was called at the request of Mr. Moody, in order that his symp- 
toms might be noted. A hypodermic injection of strychnia caused 
the heart to become stronger. Then Mr. Moody requested his 
son-in-law, Mr. Fitt, and Dr. Wood to retire. Mr. Moody's eldest 



REMINISCENCES OF MR. MOODY. 221 

son, who had been sleeping the first part of the night, spent the 
last half with his father. 

At 7.30 o'clock in the morning Dr. Wood was called, a. id 
when he reached Mr. Moody's room he found his patient in a 
semi-conscious condition. Then it was that the family were 
called to the bedside, where they remained until death came. 

How blest the righteous when he dies, 

When sinks a weary soul to rest ! 
How mildly beam the closing eyes ! 

How gently heaves th' expiring breast ! 

So fades a summer cloud away ; 

So sinks the gale when storms are o'er ; 
So gently shuts the eye of day ; 

So dies a wave along the shore. 

A holy quiet reigns around. 

A calm which life nor death destroys ; 
And naught disturbs that peace profound 

Which his unfettered soul enjoys. 

Farewell, conflicting hopes and fears, 

Where lights and shades alternate dwell ; 
How bright th' unchanging morn appears ! 

Farewell, inconstant world, farewell ! 

Life's labor done, as sinks the clay, 

Light from its load the spirit flies ; 
While heaven and earth combine to say, 

" How blest the righteous when he dies ! " 



CHAPTER XII. 

Why Mr. Moody was so Very 
Successful. 

BY REV. GEORGE F. PENTECOST, D.D. 

O write of D. L. Moody and his work one would better be 
content to do it in a paragraph, unless he were permitted the 
limits of a book. I am not to write of his work — that is 
known and read of all men the whole wide world over; but of 
the man himself as I have more or less intimately known him 
for the past twenty years, and that I am writing here in North- 
field, where the spell of his great personality is still upon me — for 
we cannot yet realize that we shall see his face and hear his voice 
no more. Had he lived in the early days of Israel's trials in the 
land the Lord God gave them he would have "judged Israel" 
and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies. 

He was a man of the stamp and character of Gideon ; whose 
latent powers were known only to God ; who, when called and 
chosen, knew only to believe, to obey, to dare, and to do. He was 
judge, prophet and preacher to the people of God during the latter 
third of the closing century. By him and his crude and sometimes 
rude, but always eloquent, speech God in our day waked up a sleep- 
ing church as truly as he did in the days of Luther and Wesley; 
Moody's name will go down bracketed with theirs in all coming time. 

Mr. Moody was one of the most widely and best known men of 
his generation. The world and even the church, nay, many of those 
who counted themselves his intimate friends and were closest to 
him in his work, only knew the outside of the man, or at least 
only that which lay a little below the surface of his personality. 
For, in spite of all his brusque, hearty and frank ways, Mr. Moody 
was the most reticent man I ever knew. Not Cromwell himself 
228 



WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 229 

more perfectly concealed Himself from those about him than did 
Mr. Moody. 

It was here in Northfield, which he loved better than any 
other spot on earth, in the seclusion of his own home, that he 
was best known, and only so far by those whom he admitted to 
the privacy of his home life. To them he would talk of the 
beauties of this place, of his plans for future work ; with them he 
would read and study the Bible ; talk of other men and workers, 
but of himself, never. To his fellow-townsmen, with whom from 
a boy he was brought up — being but the son of a poor struggling 
widow — he was ever the kind and thoughtful friend, but never the 
familiar companion. In early life he was to them " Dwight 
Moody ;" for twenty-five years past he has been Mr. Moody, only, 
and always. For twenty-five years past, few, if one of them, have 
ever familiarly laid hand upon his shoulder. 

A MAN PERFECTLY CONSECRATED. 

His deep and real piety, his utter consecration to God and the 
work which he conceived himself called of God to do, no one who 
at all knew him for a moment doubted. With all this being true, 
it is equally true — and I say it as one who has known and loved 
him long — that in some of the sweeter and gentler aspects of a 
saint's life he was singularly and, I believe, unconsciously deficient. 
Sensitive as a woman to any slight or lack of consideration from 
others, he was apt to forget that " others," even his closest friends, 
were men of like passions and sensitiveness with himself. I have 
seen him cry like a child under the sting and smart of some real 
or fancied slight or wound received in the house of his friends, but 
I have seen and known many of his friends cry with bitter pain of 
wounds inflicted by Mr. Moody's treatment of them. 

In many ways Mr. Moody was the kindest and tenderest 
hearted man I ever knew, nor do I believe he ever intentionally 
wounded any one — he simply lacked perception and did not know 
how to put himself in another man's place. 

His absorption in his work, his habit of going straight to the 
end of his purpose and never ceasing or turning aside till he 



230 WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL 

reached his goal, regardless of whoever might for the moment be in 
his way, may in part account for this trait in his character. To him 
the King's business demanded haste, nor would he pull up or stay 
his hand though a friend was under foot. He did nothing out of 
personal consideration. His rule was to estimate and value men 
for their availability in his work. If they were useful to him he 
used them, and so long as he used them, he was always kind. The 
moment they ceased to be useful or were in his way he dropped 
them, and even flung them away. 

BLUNT AND HONEST. 

This, I think, was the most serious blemish on his otherwise 
fine character. To those who gathered about him — drawn by the 
irresistible magnetism of his personality — he was at times brusque 
to the point of rudeness. On account of this characteristic, many 
prominent and able men, especially ministers, who would have been 
through life his attached and loyal helpers, have turned away from 
him, hurt to the quick, and indignant at what they esteemed 
unwarrantably rude and discourteous and unbrotherly treatment. 
But in this way he was impartial, being "no respecter of persons." 
An English gentleman once said to me, " Well, you know, we are 
all his lackeys, read}^ to fetch and carry as he may direct. He 
may make door-keepers of us, or even door-mats, if he likes, we will 
still love him and do what is in our power to serve and help him 
in his work." 

If this seems to be a record of fault in Mr. Moody's character, 
it certainly is, at the same time, a tribute to his tremendous per- 
sonality and his magnetic power over men. Perhaps this peculiar 
and, I cannot but feel, most regrettable and unfortunate trait in 
Mr. Mood}r's character may best be refuted in a remark I once 
heard made b}^ one of his truest and most loyal friends, who yet 
has for some past 3'ears dropped out of the "inner circle:" "Dear 
old Moody! We all love him, but some of us do not like him." 

It may seem ungenerous and ungracious on my part to write 
such things in the foreground of this sketch, and yet it is done 
while my heart is still quivering with the sense of personal loss in 



WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 231 

his death — whom in life I loved, and in death I mourn. And now, 
having truthfully said this, let me write of other things more con- 
sistent with my owu feelings — even though in my brief space I 
can only rapidly and imperfectly indicate some of the more 
prominent traits of his great personality. 

One of the marked characteristics of the man was his strong 
practical common sense and, in the main, fine and quick knowledge 
of men. He would instantly detect a " crank," though he some- 
times failed to discern a fine, helpful man or woman under a modest 
exterior. He lived in almost mortal terror of being imposed upon 
or of having people, men or women, fasten themselves upon him 
with axes to grind. 

NO USE FOR LONG-HAIRED CRANKS. 

Once, in the Boston Tabernacle, sitting in his private room, 
just before going on to the platform, an usher came in and said, 
" There is a man without who wishes to see you." "Well," said 
Moody, "I have no time to see him now.'' "But," replied the 
usher, "he says he must see you on very important business." 
"What kind of a man is he?" "Oh, he is a tall thin man with 
long hair." "That settles it," said Moody; "I don't want to see any 
long-haired men or short-haired women." 

He rarely made a mistake in selecting his lieutenants, though 
he often dropped them for no apparent reason, and always without 
explanation. He simply ceased to call upon them for service. In 
the management of meetings he was without a peer. He almost 
instantly knew whom to shut off, and, with a shrewd remark or 
pointed story, how to tide the course of an open meeting over shoal 
places without disturbing the harmonies. In the organization of 
great meetings or campaigns he was a past master. Nothing 
escaped him; and he knew how to hold his lieutenants responsible 
for attention to details upon the carrying out of which much of his 
success depended. 

In action — that is, in the thick of a great religious campaign — - 
he was something of a martinet. I remember a little scene be- 
tween him and the able secretary and manager of his London com- 



232 WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 

mittee, Mr. Robert Paton. It was n o'clock on a Saturday morn- 
ing. Mr. Moody had suddenly changed the plan of campaign for 
the following week, and he wanted fresh tickets ready in time to 
distribute to his five thousand workers who would assemble early 
the next (Sunday) morning at the 7 o'clock workers' meeting. 

SAID IT MUST BE DONE. 

"Paton," said he, informing him of his change of plan, " I 
want 50,000 tickets (handing him the copy) ready for the workers' 
meeting to-morrow morning." "Impossible!" said Paton. "Why 
impossible?" asked Moody. " Why," replied Paton, " this is Sat- 
urday and 1 1 o'clock. All the printing establishments close down 
work at noon to-day, and even if they did not, 50,000 tickets could 
not be prepared in half a day." They argued the point a few 
minutes, and then Mr. Moody turned upon his heel with the re- 
mark, "Paton, it must be done." 

Mr. Paton looked blankly for a moment at the huge retreating 
figure, and then went out of the room like a shot ; and in two minutes 
he was in a cab tearing down to the printing establishment. I do 
not know how it was managed, but the 50,000 tickets were distrib- 
uted the next morning to his 5,000 workers. Thus it ever was 
with Moody. Once in a critical time, during the early building 
operations at Northfield, Mr. Marshall, his general superintendent, 
said that it was absolutely necessary before the end of the week 
that a large sum of money be had. That afternoon Mr. Moody 
took a train for New York. He came back the next day with the 
money. He did not borrow it! Moody, of all men I ever knew, 
could do things, and he did them. As I heard one of his close 
friends say, "He always got there!" "And Abraham went forth to 
go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan he came." 
That was characteristic of Mr. Moody. What he went forth to 
accomplish, that he accomplished. 

Mr. Moody's reverence for all things sacred or divine was al- 
most extreme. I never heard him so much as make a play upon 
Bible words or phrases, nor would he tolerate such use of God's 
Word in his presence. A Bible conundrum or application of Scrip- 



WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 233 

ture to point a jest or joke was absolutely tabooed with him. He 
once rather sharply rebuked me for naming Peter as the " shortest" 
man in the Bible because he confessed that " silver and gold have 
I none." He was a Puritan of the Puritans in respect of the " Sab- 
bath." He would not ride on a street or steam car, even to go to a 
meeting at which he was to speak. Large, and unused and disin- 
clined as he was to walk, I have known him to walk miles, at great 
cost of strength, rather than even to be driven in a private carriage. 
And yet he would send his " gospel wagon" scouring all over 
Northfield hills on a Sunday morning to bring the poor farmers 
and their children to church. In this he did not impose his own 
conscientious scruples upon others. 

NOT CHARMED WITH "HIGHER CRITICISM." 

It goes without saying he had no sympathy with or even tol- 
eration for the " higher criticism." To George Adam Smith, two 
summers ago, when that distinguished scholar was his guest up 
here at his Northfield convention, he said, "Smith, what is the use of 
talking to the people about two Isaiahs when not half of the people 
have discovered that there is so much as one?" That was a shrewd 
and practical remark, and illustrated his point of view. " I believe 
in the old Bible as it is — -from back to back" was a common saying 
of his. 

In the hours of his relaxation, and especially in his vacation 
time, he was as jolly and genial as any man I ever knew. He had 
a strong vein of humor in his composition. This appeared in his 
public speech, and often served him well ; but in the quiet and 
retirement of home and in the social circle it came out strongly. 
Intensely fond of a good story — provided it was clean and sweet — 
I have seen him laugh until the tears would roll down his cheeks 
and his sides ache with pain ; and he would have his favorite 
stories told again and again for his own and his friends' delight. 
He was fond of play and sport, especially with young people, 
and as far as his rather unwieldy bulk would allow he would 
join in with them. He never wearied, and spared no expense 
to provide all his young people — the boys and girls of his 



234 WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 

schools — with all forms of healthy play and amusement. He even 
liked a practical joke, provided it was not played at his expense. 
He drew the line there. 

I have already spoken of his tender-heartedness and unbounded 
personal kindness to those in sorrow or need. He mourned and sor- 
rowed like a father for his children when up here, at different times, 
two or three boys and some girls were drowned while in swimming 
or killed in a carriage accident. All the passion and kindness of a 
strong and tender nature went out to the poor and for those for 
" whom nothing was provided." For men, and especially boys and 
girls, who had not what he thought "a fair chance" to get on in 
the world, he had a passionate longing — perhaps born of his own 
early experiences. It was this compassion, and his intense ap- 
preciation of the advantages of an education which inspired and led 
to the foundation of the Northfield schools, which will forever re- 
main his best and greatest visible monument. 

MONEY WAS SOMETHING TO USE. 

Mr. Moody was a man of the simplest habits and tastes. He 
spent money lavishly upon others and in his work, but little upon 
himself. He was not a lover of money, and only coveted it for the 
good it might be made to do in his work, and. latterly, especially, 
in connection with his schools. He might easily and rightfully 
have been a fairly rich man, but like Samuel and Paul, he "coveted 
no man's silver or gold." Of all the vast royalties that the hymn 
books have yielded, and of which he might rightfully have pos- 
sessed himself, I have every reason to believe he has never touched 
a penny for his own personal use. On the subject of money for 
himself I have never heard him speak, nor would he allow the 
subject discussed in his presence. 

His power over men and women was most remarkable. Not 
himself a man of culture, or skilled in drawing-room manners or 
etiquette, he drew and attached to himself men and women of the 
highest social position, of largest wealth, and of great intellectual 
ability and acquirements. Men like G. A. Smith and Henry Drum- 
mond were his greatest admirers. In the old country he was ever 



WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 235 

the honored guest of the highest in the land, and the same was 
true in his own country. The proverb concerning "a prophet" 
being "without honor in his own country" did not apply to him. 

I shall close this brief and hastily written sketch of " Dear 
old Moody" by a reference to him as the world's greatest Evangelist, 
a place which he easily held. I think it cannot be controverted 
that he has influenced more people, turned more men and women 
from sin to God, set more Christians to work for their Master, 
and stirred the whole Christian church more deeply than any man 
in modern times. In saying this, I do not forget Wesley and 
Whitfield, Edwards or Finney. He founded no sect — that was 
ever farthest from his thought — for he lived and labored for the 
whole church and sought the spiritual welfare of "all that in every 
place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs 
and ours." 

GREATEST PREACHER OF MODERN TIMES. 

He was not a theologian, but easily the greatest preacher since 
the days of Luther. Had he been a theologian, he would not have 
given himself up so entirely, as in his later years, to the "Keswick 
movement." His Gospel was the simple one of I. Cor. xv. 1-4. 
His method was not that of the theologian, much less that of the 
rhetorician; but that of a passionate appeal to the hearts and con- 
sciences of men. He was not a great reader of books, except the 
Bible, I may say hardly a reader of them at all. He was too 
impatient of long sentences and logical processes, to read. He 
read men; and when he found a full man he would suck or pump 
him dry. 

An anecdote or incident was more useful to him than an argu- 
ment. His ability to remind other people's gold was phenomenal. 
He would get an anecdote or illustration from another man and 
use it with an aptness and power that the originator never dreamed 
of. A story or illustration that would halt in the telling by 
another man would fly from Moody's lips like an eagle or a dove 
and burn from his telling like red-hot iron, or go straight to the 
mark like a rifle shot. He would condense a long argument or 



236 WHY MOODY WAS SUCCESSFUL. 

statement gathered from his living library of men into an epigram 
that would make its solid and pointed way to the heart or the con- 
science of his hearers. 

He was equally ready to seize a sling and stone from the hand 
of David, an ox-goad from Shamgar, a lamp, pitcher and trumpet 
from Gideon, or a sword from the fallen Goliath, and be able to use 
either or all of them, as occasion required or opportunity offered, 
with the skill of the original possessors of the weapons, and always 
with the impression left on his hearers that he was the original 
fashioner of them all. 

INFUSED NEW BLOOD INTO THE CHURCH. 

Of his work it must be truly said that it was the greatest of 
its kind ever v/rought by man since the Gospel began to be 
preached. It was good, with as little possible bad in it as can be 
imagined. It will last — not as an organized residuum, as Metho- 
dism has lasted, but as good blood infused into the life and body of 
the whole church of God throughout the w T orld. All Protestant 
bodies have felt the stimulus of it, and so has the Episcopal Church 
in both England and America. Even the Roman Catholic Church 
has felt the power of it. I even go so far as to say that Mr. 
Moody is the real father of the Salvation Army, though the rearing 
and training of that religious prodigy were taken in hand by 
others and directed in a way that Mr. Moody would not have sug- 
gested. 

The question has been asked: " Who will be Mr. Moody's 
successor?" The answer is: "He has not and never will have a 
successor." We might as well ask who was Moses' successor, or 
Isaiah's, or Jeremiah's, or Paul's. God will raise up other men to 
do his work, but no man will be Moody's successor. Mr. Moody's 
son is understood to be his father's chosen agent for the general 
management of the Northfield schools, but his successor he can 
never be. 

Peace to the ashes of the great man; rest to his great soul! 
We shall never on this earth see his like again. 



PART II. 



MR. MOODY'S BRILLIANT AND 
POWERFUL DISCOURSES. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

The Prodigal Son. 

WE have for our subject to-night one of the two young men 
we have read about in the 15th chapter of Luke. There is 
not a person in this audience here to-night but who is as 
well acquainted with the 15th chapter of Luke as the preacher. 
Probably there is not a prodigal in all this city but that knows 
the story as contained in this chapter of Luke. It is not necessary 
for me to tell you why this young man went away. It was his 
nature. It is natural for a man to go away from God. "All we 
like sheep have gone astray /" every one is turned too easily away. 

This prodigal went away without any reason that we know of ; 
we are not told that his father was unkind to him, but I think, 
however, that the father made a mistake. I think if I had a son 
that wanted me to divide up my property and let him have the 
share that was coming to him, I should make a great mistake to 
give him the money. A great many people are making that mis- 
take to-day, and if there is one person in this world to be pitied 
more than another, it is the man who has all the money that he 
wants to spend and nothing to do. When that young man came 
to his father and wanted him to let him have his portion, his father 
had better have said, " No, you had better wait until your father 
has gone." When the prodigal son got that which was coming to 
him, it says he gathered his goods all together and took his journey 

into a far country. 

237 



238 THE PRODIGAL SON. * 

Well, lie was considered popular in that distant country — most 
men who have plenty of money and nothing to do are very popular; 
but how long his popularity lasted we are not told, because we do 
not know just how long his money held out. But his friends 
gathered round him ; he had a good many friends until his money 
was gone, and then the poor man woke up to the fact that all those 
he called his friends had been after his money and not him ; they 
were friends to his money, not to him. And when he had spent all, 
at last he came to want. 

Did you ever stop to think how many prodigals there are in a 
city like New York ? Suppose that we had them all here to-night, 
and that we could bring them up here and let them pass in front of 
this audience, it would take a long, long time — tramp, tramp, tramp 
— before this assembled audience. New York is full of prodigals. 
They have not only left their earthly parents, they have sent many 
of those parents to an untimely grave. And how many have 
turned their backs upon God and have wandered away ! 

AS FAR AS POSSIBLE FROM HOME. 

I do not know where the prodigal son in this story went to, 
perhaps to Egypt ; perhaps he went to Memphis — that was one of 
the magnificent cities in those days — but he got as far away as he 
could from home. Perhaps he wanted to get away from home re- 
straint and home influences ; perhaps he talked as many young men 
do now, in a laughing way, saying he was only " sowing his wild 
oats." It makes my heart sad when I hear young men use that 
expression. A great many young men seem to forget that they 
have to reap what they sow tenfold. If a man sows a handful, he 
reaps a bushel ; if a man sows the wind he reaps the whirlwind ; it 
is only a question of time ; he will surely come to want some day. 

All these earthly streams become dry some day ; he will surely 
come to want. We read that when this prodigal's money jvas all 
gone, a famine struck that land and there he was alone, in a strange 
country in great want. All his friends were gone now ; he had lost 
every one of them ; he thought he had a good many friends, but 
they were now all gone. If they had had pawnshops in those days, 






THK PRODIGAL SON. 230 

you would have seen him hanging round a pawnshop pawning what 
he had left. The rings he wore away from home are gone ; perhaps 
he has worn out his shoes and has not got them to pawn ; there he 
is stripped. 

But he did not go and beg, like a great many men in these 
days. For that one thing I have respect for the prodigal, because 
he did go to work. It was a very humble occupation, to be sure, 
but if he could not get what he wanted he was willing to do most 
anything rather than to beg ; and there is no meaner occupation 
possible to a Jew than to feed swine, but he was willing to do that. If 
a great many of those people who are now called tramps would go 
to work we would all have sympathy for them. 

DIDN'T BECOME A TRAMP AND BEG. 

The prodigal got down very low, but he did not get down low 
enough to beg ; he went to work ; his work was very mean ; he could 
not have been in a meaner occupation than feeding those swine. 
When the backslider goes away from God he looses all the blessing 
of his work, and the prodigal lost all his. He had no home. A 
man who is away from God has got no home ; he has turned his 
back upon his home, and there was no home for him there among 
strangers. If the strangers had attempted to give him a home, it 
would not have been home to him, but they did not. 

There he was among strangers, coatless, shoeless, hatless ; 
some of the young men in that country came along, some of the 
very friends perhaps that had got his money away from him — for 
men gambled in those days as they do now — and they probably 
said, " Look at that fool ; he came down here with $20,000 only two 
or three years ago, and now it is all squandered." Those very men 
who had got his money away fron him began to make sport of him 
now. I think I can see him straightening himself up and saying 
to them, " You call me a beggar! Why, my father's servants dress 
better than you do ! " And they laughed and said, " Your father's 
servants — why, you have not got any father." No one believed him : 
he had lost his testimony. 

And just so has every backslider from God lost his testimony. 



240 THE PRODIGAL SON. 

You never can get any food for the soul in the devil's country. 
There he was, away from home, starving, even the food the swine 
would eat — no one would give him even that. He would fain have 
filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat. Sin had 
taken him away from home, away from God ; the point is, how did 
he ever get back. 

I suppose you prodigals all want to know how he got back, and 
you want to know how to get back yourselves, hundreds of you here 
to-night. When the man began to come to himself he woke up to 
the fact that the best friend he had in the world was his father. 
There was one thing that the prodigal never lost ; he lost his work, 
he lost his food, his home, his testimony ; but he never lost his 
father's love. His father loved him right on through it all. I find 
that a good many men, who are living in sin, wonder why it is that 
God does not answer their prayers. 

TO ANSWER SOME PRAYERS WOULD BE A CURSE. 

Well, God loves them too much to answer their prayers. Sup- 
pose the son had written his father a letter, saying, " I am in want, 
suppose you send me some money." The father would have loved 
loved him too well to answer that prayer. Your Heavenly Father 
loves you too well. If you have gone off into a foreign country ; 
if you have got away from God's tables, His arms will not reach 
you there to feed and clothe you. He wants you to go home to Him. 
That man had left home and gone into a foreign land, and the 
famine was sore upon him. One day a neighbor came down from 
his native country perhaps, and found the young man there. Said 
he, " Why do you not go home ? " " Well, I don't know. I am not 
sure my father will receive me." " Your father — he loves you as 
much as he ever did." " My father — did you see him ? " "Yes, I 
was talking with your father one day last week." " What did he 
say ? Does he ever speak of me ? " " Ever speak of you ! He 
never speaks of any one else. He dreams of you at night." 

Oh, if there is a poor prodigal here to-night, do not go on in 
that terrible delusion that your father has forgotten you. Here is 
a father that has nine children, and one is a prodigal away from 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 241 

home, but lie thinks more of that one son than he does of all 
the rest. 

One of the greatest impediments a man has got is his terrible 
pride. This young man says, " I went away with abundance. I 
went away in grand style, and now I have got to go back in rags." 
Perhaps his pride kept him away for some time. One day he came 
to himself and made up his mind to return to his father's house. 
He got • down on his knees and buried his face in his hands like 
Elijah upon Mount Carmel, and he began to think. 

"THINK I HAD BETTER GO HOME." 

He was busy thinking and he says, " Well I don't know but 
I had better go home. I think perhaps I had. In fact there is no 
one in the world who loves me as much as my father," and he just 
lets his mind go back into the past ; it sweeps over his whole life ; 
it goes down into his childhood ; he remembers his father and 
mother — how they loved him, and how they watched over him. 
He thinks of the tears of his mother. I cannot help but think 
he had lost his mother — for there is no one who could be more 
interested in the boy than his mother, and it don't say anything 
about her. He thinks how after mother died, father was about as 
tender as mother. 

He says, " I remember the morning I left home, how the old 
man wept and sobbed over me. He tried to conceal his feelings, 
but I remember how he begged me to stay at home, and I remember 
how he prayed that morning around the family altar, how he asked 
the Lord God of heaven to save his boy from sin, and how he asked 
that God might send His angels to watch over me." Everything 
was vivid in his mind, miles away, back in his native town. He 
says, "Here I am, shoeless, coatless, and just covered with these 
miserable rags." And he took a look out in the future and how 
dark it looked. 

"Why, the very servants are better off than I am; there is 

bread enough and to spare in my father's house;" and the young 

man came to himself, and he said, " I will." That is the time that 

his heart turned back to his God. I would to God we could get 
16 



242 THE PRODIGAL SON. 

thousands to say that word to-night, "I will arise and go to my 
Father." Nine-tenths of the battle was won when he said, "I 
will arise and go to my father." He may be in a far country, but 
he will soon get home if he has made up his mind to come. And 
he made up a sort of a sermon he was going to preach when he 
got home. The first thing he was going to do was to confess. "I 
will confess that I have sinned against heaven. I will confess 
that I have done wrong, and I will ask if he will let me be as 
one of his servants." 

THE BELLS OF HEAVEN RING. 

Ah, he didn't know his father's heart; if he had he wouldn't 
have asked the rest. He says, "I will just ask my father to let 
me be as one of his servants." But now he had made up his 
mind to go home, and he starts. He goes to the citizen of that 
country and he says, "I have made up my mind to go home, and 
I can't work for you any longer. My father is well off, and I am 
sure my father will receive me back." The citizen don't care 
anything about him, but there is a living heart there at home, 
and he starts. I see him on his way, and there is joy up there 
now; they ring the bells of heaven. I see the guardian angel 
that watches over him, and the moment he came to himself then 
there was joy on high. 

Then the prodigal is out on his way — see him! I can just 
imagine his feelings as he came over the border of his native 
land — "It may be father has died; may be he is dead? If he is, 
may be I may not get a warm welcome." It was a good thing 
for the prodigal that his father was alive, wasn't it ? He wouldn't 
have received a very warm welcome from that brother of his. 
Ah, young man, you had better make the most of that experience 
and get home before that old father dies, unless you have got a 
godly, praying mother. Go down to your houses to-night and 
write a letter to your mother or your father and ask them to for- 
give you! Ask your father in Heaven to forgive you. 

But now see him as he going along toward home, wondering 
if that father is alive waiting for him. There is the old man out 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 243 

on the flat roof. Many a time he has been there before. Many a 
time his eye has been looking in the direction where his boy went. 
He cannot tell him by anything he has on; but love is keen. He 
saw his boy afar off; that was his long-lost boy. He starts out 
after him. You can see his long white hair floating through the 
air; he leaps over the highway; the spirit of youth has come 
jiipon him. The servants look at him leaping over the highway, 
and they wonder what has come over him. It is the only time 
God is represented as running, just to meet a poor sinner. God 
walks. When those children of Israel were thrust in that fiery 
furnace, we find that God walked in that furnace. 

A STORY OF DIVINE COMPASSION. 

The whole story of that prodigal is just written to bring out 
God's love, or the compassion of God. "And when he saw him 
a great way off he had compassion on him." He did not wait for 
him to come. He did not say, "He went away without cause, I 
will not go to meet him." And when he meets him, he falls upon 
his neck, and he weeps over him ; and the servants come running 
out to see what is the matter. And the boy begins to make his 
speech : "Father, I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight, 
and am no more worthy to be called thy son!" And just as he 
was going to say, "make me as one of thy hired servants," the 
father interrupts him and he says to one servant, "Go bring the 
best robe and put it on him;" and to another, "Go to my jewel- 
box and get a ring and put it on his finger;" and to another one, 
"Go and get the shoes ;" and to another, " Go and kill the fatted 
calf." And there was joy there. What joy there was in that 
home! "He had compassion on him." 

My friend, don't you know that since then that story has 
been repeated nearly every day — prodigals going back — and I 
never yet heard of any man going back that did not get a warm 
welcome. There isn't a poor prodigal in this city but that if he 
will go back to his father, will receive a warm welcome. But that 
isn't the lesson we want to teach. It is not only to be reconciled 
to your earthly father, but my friends, to your Heavenly Father. 



244 THE PRODIGAL SON. 

The most reasonable thing you can do is to go to your Heavenly 
Father, and ask His forgiveness. 

I have got a letter here, I think it is one of the last letters I 
received from England. The letter goes on to state that a son 
and husband had left his father's house — left his wife and chil- 
dren without cause ; and now in closing up the letter the sister 
says : " He need not fear reproach, only love awaits him at 
home." That man may be here to-night. My words may 
reach him, and if so I beg him to return from his erring ways. 
Listen, your sister says that no reproach or harsh words will meet 
you on your return home, only love will welcome you when 3^-ou 
enter the door. Oh, do not spurn your sister's words, or the tears 
of the loved ones far away. The father of the prodigal did not 
reproach his boy ; did not have unwelcome words when he had 
returned from his wanderings. 

TO RETURN MEANS TO BE FORGIVEN. 

And so God does not reproach the sinner. He knows what 
human nature is — how liable a mortal is to go astray. It is 
human to err. He is always ready to forgive and take you back. 
Christ says He will forgive ; He is full of love and compassion 
and tenderness. If a poor sinner comes and confesses, God is 
willing and ready to forgive you. He will forgive you the hour, 
yes, the minute, of your return. Oh, you that have gone astray, 
remember this. 

There was a lady that came down to Liverpool to see us pri- 
vately ; it was just before we were about to leave that city to go 
up to London to preach. With tears and sobs she told a very 
pitiful story. It was this : She said she had a boy nineteen years 
of age who had left her. She showed me his photograph, and 
asked me to put it in my pocket. " You stand before many and 
large assemblies, Mr. Moody. My boy may be in London, now. 

"Oh, look at the audiences to whom you will preach; look 
earnestly. You may see my dear boy before you. If you do 
see him, tell him to come back to me. Oh, implore him to 
come to his sorrowing mother, to his deserted home. He may 

! 



THE FKUDiGAL SUN. 245 

be in trouble ; lie may be suffering ; tell him for his loving 
mother that all is forgiven and forgotten, and he will find com- 
fort and peace at home.'' On the back of this photograph she 
had written his full name and address ; she had noted his com- 
plexion, the color of his eyes and hair ; why he had left home, and 
the cause of his so doing. " When you preach, Mr. Moody, look 
for my poor boy," were the parting words of that mother. That 
young man may be in this hall to-night. If he is, I want to tell 
him that his mother loves him still. 

SEEKING LOST WANDERERS. 

I will read out his name, and if any of you ever hear of that 
young man just tell him that his mother is waiting with a loving 
heart and a tender embrace for him. His name is Arthur P. 
Oxley, of Manchester, England. You who have got children 
around you and about you, and can feel the pangs that agitate the 
breasts of these families whose chief joy and delights are gone, 
lift up your hearts to God for this erring father, and for this wan- 
dering boy. If they be anywhere yet on the face of the earth, 
pray to God that He will turn their hearts and bring them back. 

Perhaps there is no subject in the Bible that takes hold of me 
with as great force as this subject of the wandering sinner. It en- 
ters deeply into my own life. It comes right home into our own 
family. The first thing I remember was the death of my father. It 
was a beautiful day in June when he fell suddenly dead. The shock 
made such an impression on me, young as I was, that I shall never 
forget it. I remember nothing about the funeral, but his death has 
made a lasting impression upon me. 

The next thing that I remember was that my mother was taken 
very sick. And the next thing that occurred in our family that 
impressed my young mind was that my eldest brother, to whom my 
mother looked up to comfort her in her loneliness and in great 
affliction, became a wanderer — he left home. I need not tell you 
how that mother mourned for her boy — how she waited day by day 
and month by month for his return. I need not say how night after 
night she watched and wept and prayed. Many a time we were 



246 THE PRODIGAL SON. 

told to go to the post-office to see if a letter had not come from Him. 
But we had to bring back the sorrowful words, " No letter, yet, 
mother." Many a time have I waked up and heard my mother 
pray: " Oh, God, bring back my boy ! " Many a time did she lift 
her heart up to God in prayer for her boy. When the wintry gale 
would blow around the house, and the storm rage without the door, 
her dear face would wear a terribly anxious look, and she would 
utter in piteous tones, " Oh, my dear boy ; perhaps he is now on the 
ocean this fearful night. Oh, God, preserve him ! " We would sit 
around the fireside on an evening and ask her to tell us about our 
father, and she would talk for hours about him. 

EMPTY CHAIR AT THE TABLE. 

But if the mention of my eldest brother should chance to come 
in, then all would be hushed ; she never spoke of him but with tears. 
Many a time did she try to conceal them, but all would be in vain, 
and when Thanksgiving Day would come a chair used to be set for 
him. Our friends and neighbors gave him up, but our mother had 
faith that she would see him again. One day in the middle of 
slimmer a stranger was seen approaching the house. He came up 
on the east piazza and looked upon my mother through the window. 
The man had a long beard, and when my mother first saw him she 
did not start or rise. But when she saw the great tears trickling 
down his cheeks she cried, " It's my boy, my dear, dear boy/' and 
sprang to the window. 

But there the boy stood and said, " Mother, I will never cross 
the threshold until you say you forgive me." Do you think he had 
to stay there long ? No, no. Her arms were soon around him, and 
she wept upon his shoulder, as did the father of the prodigal son. 
I heard of it while in a distant city, and what a thrill of joy shot 
through me. But what joy on earth can equal the joy in Heaven 
when a prodigal comes home ! This night your Father wants you. 
Dear son, come to Him. Confess your sin, and He will have mercy 
upon you and forgive you. May Heaven's blessing rest upon every 
soul here is my prayer. Let us pray. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

God is Love. 

T WANT to take for our subject to-night what Christ is to us, 
X and when I get through, and any one of our friends says he is 

not convinced, it will be because you don't want to be convinced, 
and will not have Him. He will be all that I make Him out to be, 
and a thousand times more. No man living could tell about His 
great love and great necessity to us in an hour ; nay, he could not 
tell it in twenty-four hours. It is beyond thought and beyond ex- 
pression to tell what Christ is to us — that is, if we have believed on 
Him and been redeemed by Him. 

I remember speaking upon this subject some time ago in 
Europe, and when I got through and was going home, I said to a 
Scotch friend of mine, who was in my company, that I was very 
much disappointed ; that I did not get through with the subject. 
He looked at me in astonishment, and said, " My friend, what ! did 
ye expect to tell what Christ is in half an hour ? Ye need never 
expect to tell it in all eternity ; you would never get through with 
it." I have thought of it often since. Take eternity ! Yes, I 
know it would. 

Well, right here I want to ask you whether Christ is worth 
having ? I imagine that some of you will say that that is a strange 
question — a man to get up and ask that. Well, perhaps it is; but 
it does seem to me that a great many men do think that Christ is 
not worth having. If they do really want Him let them take Him. 
He was God's greatest gift to the world. He is there for you and 
for me to partake of. Just let me ask that question again, Do you 
think the Son of God worth having ? Oh, that God may open the 
eyes of every lost soul here to-night to see Christ here right in the 
midst of them. Oh, that you may worship Him in spirit and in 
truth, view him as the chief among thousands, the One altogether 
lovely. Christ wants to be a Saviour to every one of us. 

247 



248 GOD IS LOVE. 

In the second chapter of Lnke and the tenth verse we read 
that a Saviour has been given us : " Behold, I bring you good tidings 
of great joy , which shall be to all people ; for unto you is born this 
day, in the City of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.'* 
And if we know he is our Lord and truth and wisdom and life, we 
must first know Him as our Saviour. You must first meet Him at 
Calvary — first see Him on the cross. There is no life in us except 
we come to Calvary — no life until we come to that mountain. Now, 
I don't want you to think I mean to ask } t ou to trust in the form. 
Many, yea thousands, make that great mistake. We are not tak- 
ing Him as a personal Saviour ; we don't try to know Him as our 
own. This is a great mistake, and it is a common mistake. 

DELIVERANCE FROM ALL EVIL. 

During the last few years I was not occupied with the person 
of Christ ; it was more about the doctrine and about the form. 
But lately Christ is more to me personally. And it would be a 
great help to you to cultivate His acquaintance personally, and 
come to Him as the personal Saviour, and be able to take Him and 
look up to Him and say, " He is my Saviour." I don't know how 
many times I have heard men say during the past few weeks, " I 
would come to Him and love Him, but I don't think I could hold 
out." But I tell you, He is not only a Saviour, but a Deliverer. 
He can deliver us from the power of sin. He can deliver us from 
Satan. There is not a guilt, crime, trouble or trial but that if we 
go to the Son of God He is able to deliver us from it. 

Bear in mind that we are the lawful captives of sin. If a man 
has committed a sin, Satan has a power over him and a claim upon 
him and holds him as his lawful prey. But saith the Lord, " Even 
the captives of the mighty shall be taken away." And He saith 
further that He will contend for thee and take thee from those that 
hold thee captive. Thanks be to God, we can go to Him with con- 
fidence, and have Him deliver us from the power of our besetting 
sin. If there be a man here who is the slave of strong drink, I 
bring him good news ! God is able to deliver you from that which 
has gained the mastery over you. 



GOD IS LOVE. 219 

If there "be a man here who is the slave of any passion, or any 
lust, I say unto him that the Son of God came into the world to 
destroy the works of the devil and deliver you from the power of 
Satan ; and he wants to deliver not only you, but to deliver every 
soul, and you can, if you will, be saved this very minute. When 
He led the children of Israel out from Egypt and through the Red 
Sea, He saved them at once. So can every one be saved, no matter 
what church he belongs to, whether he belongs to the true Apostolic 
church or to any other church. The Son of God can save in any 
church or in any denomination. Every minister will say his is a 
true church. But you can be saved in any church if you follow Him. 
" I am the way, the truth, and the life." 

The Son of God will be in the right church ; He makes no 
mistake. He never leads His people into a wrong path. Christ is 
the way. He said unto Peter " follow Me," and Peter did follow 
Him and found everlasting life. Who can lead people through the 
wilderness but the Lord Almighty? He created the wilderness, 
and He knows it better than anyone else. He will take care that 
none of His children are lost. He will put before them the pillar 
of fire, and the cloud to shield them from the sun. 

OLD WAY THE TRUEST AND BEST. 

No man that follows in the footsteps of Christ can be in the 
wrong way. Christ says, " I am the way." Yes, but some people 
say that is the old way ; I want something new. But I say unto 
you that the old way is the best and the only way. The way, 
young man, that your sainted mother trod, is the right way. Don't 
you go in any other way. When men who don't believe in Christ 
came and say they have found a new way, don't believe them. 
Don't believe these infidels. They want to take the Bible from you. 
But what do they intend to give you in its place ? They call to you 
to give up your Bible, but what can they do for you without that ? 

They might offer you " Paine's Age of Reason ! " What a book 
to put in the place of our beloved Bible ! Why, even the infidels 
would not have it themselves. What consolation, what comfort, 
what joy, could be got from such a book as they would give to you? 



250 GOD IS LOVE. 

What pain would it assuage, what comfort would it bring to you ? 
They say'" We have grown wiser than the Bible, now ; it is an old 
worn-out Book." Why on the same principle they might complain 
of the sun, and yet what would they put in the place of its warmth, 
its genial influence, its life-giving power. Let them give up the 
sun, then, and try to supply the world with gas-light. The sun is 
thousands of years old, but gas is new : use gas then in place of the 
sun. Strike out all the windows of your houses, and have nothing 
to do with it. You might as well do that as give up the Bible. 

THE BIBLE IS THE ONLY BOOK. 

Outgrown it ! Why, there is no book to be compared with it. 
No other book will lift up the world. Try and bring up your chil- 
dren without the Bible and see what they will come to. Go into 
a town and try to live without that good book. You would flee from 
it as they who left Sodom and Gomorrah. Have the infidels ever 
produced a Knox, Bunyan, or Milton ? When a man goes into 
the wilderness to hunt, he takes a hatchet with him and cuts the 
bark of the trees — they call it "blazing" — and thus he can find 
his way out. So God has blazed the way along ; He has gone up 
on high and he says, " Follow Me." Just come now and follow 
the Son of God, for there is life there. 

But this means something more than that. He is the light 
upon our way. Now, I hear so many people complaining about 
the darkness, but there is no darkness in following Christ. I have 
seen a picture lately that I don't enjoy a great deal. It represents 
Christ knocking at the door with a lantern. What does the Son 
of God want with a lantern? Christ says, "I am the light of 
the world ; " He doesn't need any lantern. Did you ever find a 
man or woman an}^where in Christendom that was following the 
Son of God that was in darkness ? 

A man who is following Christ can't help but be in light, 
because He is the light of the world. Yes, and it carries us 
beyond the grave and beyond the judgment. We don't fear death. 
It can't be very dark, because Christ is there, and He will be in 
*he way. Haven't you been at the bedside of a dying saint, and 



GOD IS LOVE. 251 

haven't you seen the light that streamed in there, and yon thought 
you was just at the very portals of heaven? Do you know why 
it was light there ? Why the curtain was lifted, and like Stephen 
they could look in the Celestial City ? 

A great many people are looking for peace and are looking for 
joy, and they hear this minister and that minister and this person 
and that person speak about peace and joy. You just follow 
Christ and it will come of itself. When I was a little boy I used 
to try to catch my shadow, but I always failed. Many a time I 
might try to see if I could jump over my head; many a time I 
tried to see if I could not outrun it, but it always kept ahead of 
me. But I turned around and faced the sun, and lo, and behold, 
my shadow was coming after me. And so we want to look toward 
Christ, and peace and joy and happiness will come in turn. We 
don't want to turn our backs to the light, but keep our eyes upon 
Christ and never turn them away. 

LET YOUR LIGHT SHINE. 

Look unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith ; not 
look to see what neighbor Jones is doing, to see if we ain't better 
than he is. We will never get much peace in that way. What is 
the standard? Look up. Look up to-night because there is 
darkness around us. We are not to look around us, but we are 
to keep looking up. Christ is the light of the world, and you 
know the world refused to have the light ; they put it out ; they 
took him to Calvary and they put Him to death. Just before they 
put Him out He says, u Ye are the light of the world." What 
Christ has left us down here for is to shine. We are not put here 
to make money, but that we may shine out like Daniel in Baby- 
lon, and if a man will let his light shine — it don't say make it 
shine — the light will shine out of our countenance, and the 
world will see there is a living reality in the religion of Jesiu / 
Christ. 

I remember in the darkest hours in the history of our coun- 
try, when it looked as if everything was going to pieces, I remem- 
ber attending a prayer-meeting one Sunday night, and every one 



252 GOD IS LOVE. 

spoke on the dark side, and an old man, the light shining ont of 
his eyes, and his beautiful white hair falling over his shoulders, 
said, " You don't talk like true sons of the King. It is all light 
up around the throne. If an unconverted man should come in here 
and listen to you he certainly wouldn't want to become a Chris- 
tian." 

He said he had just come from the East, and he had heard 
one of his friends talk about a beautiful sunrise, and he made ar- 
rangements with the landlord to take him up on the summit to see 
the sunrise. So in the morning the guide aroused him and they 
started out. The guide went ahead and he followed. He said they 
had not been gone a great while when there came a terrible thun- 
der storm, and the old man said to the guide, " It will be no use to 
go up ; we can't see the sun rise ; the storm is fearful." " O, sir," 
said the guide, " I think we will get above the storm." They could 
see the lightning playing about them, and the great old mountain 
shook with the thunder, and it was very dark ; but when they got 
up above the clouds all was light and clear. 

LIGHT ABOVE THE CLOUDS. 

So if it is dark here, rise higher ; it is light enough up around 
the throne. If I may rise up to the light, I have no business to be 
in darkness. Rise higher, higher, higher. It is the privilege of 
the child of God to walk on unclouded. Sinner, look up from this 
night and from this hour. Now I don't know but there may be 
some infidel, some skeptic here. I heard of an infidel once who said, 
" Look at your convert ; it is all moonshine." The young convert 
replied to him, % ' I thank you for the compliment. We are perfectly 
willing to be called that. The moon borrows the light from the 
sun, and so we borrow ours from Christ." And so bear in your 
minds, my friends, that we borrow our light from Christ. 

In the 121st Psalm it is written, " Behold He that keepeth 
Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper." 
If He is our keeper, can anything hurt us ? Keep this in your 
hearts, that Christ is able to save you ; He is not only able to light 
you upon the way, but He is able to keep you from this night and 



COD IS LOVE. 253 

from this hour, until He presents you before the throne without spot 
and without blemish. Don't tell me He doesn't have the power to 
keep you. He has. That is what Christ came into the world for, 
to keep sinners. Some men have an idea when they get converted 
that they have got to keep Christ and themselves, too. It is all 
wrong. 

LITTLE GIRL AND HER MUFF. 

I remember one time my little girl was teasing her mother to 
get her a muff, and so one day her mother brought a muff home, 
and, although it was storming, she very naturally wanted to go out 
in order to trv her new muff. So she tried to get me to go out with 
her. I went out with her, and I said, " Emma, better let me take 
your hand." She wanted to keep her hands in her muff, and so 
she refused to take my hand. Well, by and by she came to an 
icy place, her little feet slipped, and down she went. When I 
helped her up she said, " Papa, you may give me your little finger." 
c< No, my daughter, just take my hand." " No, no, papa, give me 
your little finger." Well, I gave my finger to her, and for a little 
way she got along nicely, but pretty soon we came to another icy 
place, and again she fell. This time she hurt herself a little, and 
she said, " Papa, give me your hand," and I gave her my hand, and 
closed my fingers about her wrist, and held her up so that she could 
not fall. 

Just so God is our keeper. He is wiser than we. Run to your 
Elder Brother for aid. Is there a man here to whom a saloon is a 
temptation ? Who can't go by a saloon without wanting to go in ? 
Just let him throw himself upon the Lord. Say, " Lord Jesus, 
keep me." 

There are thousands and millions around the throne of God 
to-night. Yes, God gave them grace, and overcame all things for 
them. Thank God, oh, thank God for that. When I was in 
England I had a great curiosity to visit the Zoological Gardens, 
because of a story I heard concerning them. There was a man 
who had a little dog which he had trained to run. So one day he 
made a bet about his dog's running, but when the time came for the 



254 GOD IS LOVE. 

race the little dog wouldn't run at all and the man lost all his 
money. This so enraged the man that he beat the dog terribly, 
and at last he tucked him into the lion's cage. He thought the lion 
would make quick work of him, but the lion lapped the dog and 
made a pet of him, so at last the men wanted to get his dog back, 
and he called to him, and tried by every means to make the little 
dog come out of cage, but he wouldn't come. 

So the man went and told a man about it, and the man told 
the keeper, and when the keeper came, the man said to him, 
"That's my dog in the cage there, and I want you to get him out 
for me." Then the keeper said, "How came the dog there?" 
And the man had to tell, and the keeper said, "If you want your 
dog you can take him out of the cage." He could not take him 
out, and there he stayed for twenty } T ears. The only safety is to 
keep close to Christ, the lion of the tribe of Judah. 

THE FAITHFUL SHEPHERD. 

"The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want." Ah! what a 
shepherd. The shepherd takes care of the sheep. Did you ever 
hear of the sheep taking care of the shepherd? Strive to get 
into the fold. The Lord is my shepherd. Oh! what a good 
shepherd. But I want to speak of another thing that the Lord 
is. He is a burden-bearer. I will not speak of His wisdom, 
righteousness, strength, power. It would take eternity to tell it. 

There is not a poor, sin-weary mortal that may not at once 
cast his burden upon Christ. Cast all your burden upon the 
Lord. People sometimes pray to have their burdens taken from 
them, and then they will rise up and take their burdens on their 
shoulders and go away unrelieved. I like to think of Christ as 
the burden-bearer. A minister was moving his librae up-stairs. 
His little boy wanted to help him, so he gave him the biggest 
book he could find, and the little fellow tugged at it till he got it 
about half-way up, and then he sat down and cried. His father 
found him, and just took him in his arms, big book and all, and 
carried him up stairs. So Christ will carry you and all your 
burdens. 



CHAPTER XV. 

Christ's Mission to the World. 

¥OU will find my text this evening in the 19th chapter of the 
Gospel according to St. Luke, and part of the 10th verse : 
"For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was 
lost" In this little short verse the whole mission of Christ is told. 
He came for a purpose, He came to do a work, and we get the in- 
formation of what He came to do in this verse — he came to save 
sinners — to save the lost. If yon will look in your Bibles care- 
fully you will find that every man that God sent before Christ 
had a work to do, and he always succeeded, and do you think that 
God will send His Son to do work on earth and not give Him 
power and strength to do that work ? He sent His Son here to 
save sinners, and He did give Him the power to accomplish that 
work. 

Do you think that Christ, who voluntarily came into the 
world to save sinners, is not willing to receive all that come to 
Him — not willing to save them? Now let us take up this verse 
and look at it on every side, and look around it, and see how it 
was that He uttered these words. In the last part of the 18th 
chapter, that I read this evening, we find Christ coming near to 
the City of Jericho. A man who had come down to Jerusalem 
had met a poor blind beggar sitting by the wayside. The beggar 
had probably asked him for something — some money. But the 
stranger said to him, "I have got something more precious than 
silver or gold; you may get back your sight." u Oh," says Bar- 
timeus, "that cannot be; there is no chance for me. I have not 
got eye-balls, even. I was born blind; never saw the mother that 
gave me birth; never saw the wife that leaned on my breast; 
never saw my offspring; never saw my friends or neighbors or 
the light of heaven." "But," says the stranger, "it is yet true; 
for I have come down from Jerusalem, and I saw there a man who 

255 



256 CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 

had been born blind, jnst as bad as yon are now, and lie received 
bis sight." " Received bis sight!" said the beggar; u oh, tell me 
how it was; tell me all abont it." 

And the man went on and told him how Christ had given the 
man sight. He told him that he had seen Christ stoop down on 
the earth, spit upon it and make some mud of the clay, and put the 
mixture on the eyes of the man, and, behold ! the man received his 
sight. Why, if a man has the best eyes in the world — to make a 
mixture like that and put it in his eyes ! But God's ways are not 
like our ways. He does not work as we think He would work. 
But the man went on and assured Bartimeus that the man after 
this operation had actually received as good sight as he ever had. 
And the man proceeded, and further told the beggar that he had 
something more to say, and that was it did not cost the man 
anything. 

SIGHT RESTORED TO THE BLIND. 

Oh, what a physician that was ! We never had such a phsi- 
cian, and never will have. Just think that a man restores your sight 
and never charges you anything for it ! It was never heard of 
before that a man should receive this great blessing and not receive 
it without paying money or doing anything to secure this great 
mercy. You have not got to send a deputation to this great Prophet, 
to give him money, or to use influence with Him, or to plead 
with Him. All you have to do is to ask Him, and you will get 
your petition. After this information, which Bartimeus received 
with the greatest astonishment, he replied, " Oh, if He only comes 
this way, I will ask Him, and I will present my petition to Him." 

And so it is, my Christian friends, with Christ to-day. Ask 
Him what you want, and you have God's own word that ye shall 
receive it. Did you ever see a man that went to God and asked 
Him properly , and for a proper thing, that he didn't get it ? Ask 
the Lord always, and He is always ready to give. And I can 
imagine the joy with which Bartimeus received these glad tidings. 
In what a forlorn and desperate condition had Bartimeus been ! 
You can see him being led out by one of his children along the 



CHRIST'S mission TO THE WORLD. 257 

streets from day to day, or by a faithful dog, to ask alms from his 
fellows as they passed by. " Give," he would say, " a poor blind 
beggar a farthing ; I have been blind these many years ; I am des- 
titute ; help me." 

He had sat in the same place before, and he received his usual 
pittance. But now there is going to happen a great thing. He is 
in his accustomed place ; he hears the footsteps of a crowd 
approaching, and he asks, " What does it mean ? Who is that 
coming ?" And they tell him that it is Jesus of Nazareth who is 
passing by. I can imagine the thrill that pervades the poor man. 
Here is Jesus of whom he has heard ; here is his great chance, his 
golden opportunity. This is his time, and he cries out with a loud 
voice, " Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me." 

NOTHING COULD HUSH HIS CRY. 

Perhaps it was Peter that turned round upon him and told him 
to hush. He thought that Jesus was going to be crowned King of 
the Jews as soon as he reached the city, and he did not think it 
became any one to disturb him. Or, perhaps, it was John who did 
not understand the cry. But he still kept on — they told him to be 
still in vain — " Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy upon me ! " 
And our Lord looked that way , He never hears a man cry unto 
Him in vain. And Jesus stopped and commanded the man to be 
brought unto Him. 

I can just picture that scene when they came running up to 
the poor blind man. " The man has sent for you," they say. Yes, 
God never sends for any one yet : ,but that He has a blessing in store 
for him. They take him by the hand and lead him to Jesus. The 
Lord asked what could He do for him, and Bartimeus replied, 
" Lord, that I may receive my sight." And the heart of the Son of 
God was moved with compassion, and He said to him that he should 
receive his sight, and immediately the man saw, and the first object 
he saw on getting the light was the Son of God Himself. Then he 
goes among the crowd, and no one shouts louder than Bartimeus. 
He shouts glory to God in the highest, and he presses on after 
Christ on his way to the city. 
17 



258 CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 

You can all take in the jc^ of that moment that had arrived to 
this poor man. When he gets to the city he leaves the crowd, and 
says he will just step round and see his wife. He had never seen 
her before, and wanted to find out what sort of a wife he had. He 
also wanted to see his children. Well, as he goes on his way a man 
meets him and looks at him in astonishment. " What, who is this ? 
Is your name Bartimeus ? " " Yes," says Bartimeus, " it is I." 
" Why," says his fellow-citizen, " how's this ? I thought you were 
blind." " Yes," says Bartimeus, " I was blind, but I just met Jesus 
outside the city, and He has given me my sight." 

HE CAME DOWN INSTANTLY. 

Another man also heard of Jesus, and another convert was 
made — Zaccheus. And just here I want to put this picture before 
the minds of those who don't believe in sudden conversions. This 
Zaccheus had gone up among the branches and the leaves of a 
sycamore tree, but as Jesus passed under He saw the man, and said 
at once to him, " Zaccheus, come down," and the eye and the voice 
of the Son of God flashed life into the soul of Zaccheus. He told 
Zaccheus that that was the last time he should pass that way ; and, 
sinner, when God calls upon you it may be the last time you will 
ever hear his voice. But Zaccheus heard the voice and obeyed it, 
and he was not scared into obeying it, either. Some persons at the 
present day would rather be scared into the Kingdom of Heaven 
than any other way. But that is not the way that Jesus did. 

Some of these professed Christians talk against sudden conver- 
sions ; but how long did it take the Lord to convert Zaccheus ? 
He must have been converted getting down. It was right in the 
air, between the branches and the ground. You see those people 
who say, " I don't believe these are genuine conversions." Ah, I 
wish we could have a few more conversions like Zaccheus. Zaccheus 
,gave one-half of his goods to the poor. Do you think you could 
make a poor man in Jericho believe that conversion not genuine ? 
If we could have a few more conversions like that here, do you think 
you could make the poor people in this city believe that that conver- 
sion wasn't genuine ? 



CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 250 

I tell you if men are converted like Zaccheus the people 
wouldn't be talking against conversions then. Zaccheus gave half 
his goods to the poor. Zaccheus did more than that , he said, " If I 
have taken anything from any man falsely I will restore him four- 
fold." It made a great stir in Jericho. The people said, " There 
is a true disciple." It was like a flashing meteor; and how sudden 
it was. You must remember one thing ; if you don't give half 
your goods to the poor, you must make restitution. If you have 
lied about a man, if you have slandered a man, if you have abused 
a man, go and tell him that you have done him an injustice ; go and 
make restitution. 

HAD BEEN A RANK SCOFFER. 

I felt much encouraged last night ; a man came into the inquiry 
room and said, " Mr. Moody, I want you to forgive me." " Why," 
said I, "I have got nothing to forgive you for; I never met you before." 
" Well," said the man, " I have been abusing you for about a year. 
I was here last night and I got converted, and I want to ask your 
forgiveness." He had been abusing me and slandering me, and 
been talking about something he didn't know anything about. 
There was a man in Brooklyn who said about restitution : " There 
is a shoemaker's bill I have been owing, and I have owed it for nine 
years." So he went around the next day and paid it. The shoe- 
maker said, "Well, I believe in those kind of meetings now." 
He didn't believe in them before. 

What we want is to have men become disciples of Jesus 
Christ. I may be speaking to some clerk to-night who has taken 
money from his employer falsely. It may be that he has covered 
up his track, and no one knows it but the all-seeing eye of God. 
But you can't look up, and you can't have the sympathies of God, 
and you can't be converted unless you make restitution. It may 
be that you have squandered the money, and can't make restitu- 
tion ; but go right to that man you have injured and confess it. 

There was a man who had robbed his employer of $500, and 
the spirit of God aroused him and he went to one of our ministers 
and told the story. He wanted to become a Christian, but there 



260 CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 

was the $500 right in his mind all the while. "Well," said the 
minister, "your path is very clear; you must pay back the 
money." " But," said the man, " I can't pay it back." " Then," 
said the minister, "you must go back to your employer, and con- 
fess it." But the man said, " My employer is a hard-hearted man, 
and if I confess it he will put me in prison." And the man 
couldn't do it, he thought. " Well," said the minister, " I will go 
and see your employer." And he went into the office of the man 
and told the story. "Now," said the minister, "I have reason to 
believe that that man has been converted of his sin. I believe if 
you will forgive it, and if you give him a chance, you may save 
the soul of the man, and he will work and pay back the money." 
The man said, "He shall never hear a word from me," and the 
result is that the clerk has now become a joyful Christian. 

RESTORED MONEY OBTAINED UNLAWFULLY. 

And so if you want to become followers of the Lord Jesus 
Christ you must make restitution. Zaccheus made restitution. 
He went into his office and made out a check for neighbor- 
so-and-so, and for neighbor so-and-so, for $100, and then sent 
his clerk around and offered and urged different men to take 
this money ; and do you think these men that had been rob- 
bed thought his conversion wasn't genuine ? He paid back 
not only what he had taken, but he restored them four-fold. 
Do you think those men didn't have confidence in Zaccheus ? 
There wasn't a man in all Jericho that didn't believe in his con- 
version. I can imagine a man saying, "Your master didn't owe 
me anything." But the clerk answers, " My master told me to 
tell you he had taxed you too much." What a smile came over 
his face. " What has come over this man ? There was a time 
when he was unreasonable. He is giving money to the poor, and 
he is making restitution ; that is a genuine conversion ! " That 
is an evidence of the Son of God breathing life into a man's soul. 

If we could only get the confession of a man that he is lost, 
it wouldn't be long before he woud be saved. If a man aint lost 
why has he need of a Saviour ? But, oh, how refreshing it is to 




REV. R. A. TORREY 

MR. MOODY'S CO-LABORER IN HIS CHICAGO MISSION 




TAMIL DAVID OF INDIA-CALLED THE HINDOO MOODY 



CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 261 

find oue who will admit that he is lost. If you will admit that 
you are a sinner, I can tell you there's One mighty to save — One 
who came to save sinners. I was invited to preach in the Tombs 
a few years ago. I supposed there was a chapel, as there are in 
most of our prisons, in which the prisoners would be gathered for 
me to talk to them. But I found they were in their cells, and I 
had to speak to them there. There were two tiers of cells above 
me, one below and one on a level with me. There were three or 
four hundred prisoners, but I couldn't see a face ; it seemed as if 
I was talking to a wall or to the air. 

EVERY ONE OF THEM INNOCENT. 

And when I got through I thought I'd like to see who and 
what I had been talking to. When I looked in the first cell, I saw 
the prisoners playing cards, and I said, " How is it with you ?" 
And they hesitated, and then said there had been false witnesses in 
the case, and they ought not to be there. In the second cell, when 
I spoke to them they said, " Well, we'll tell you, Chaplain, we got 
into bad company, and those that were with us got away and we 
got caught. We hadn't done anything wrong." And the prisoner 
in the next cell had an excuse : " The man that did it looked just 
like me, but they took me for him although I am innocent." And 
in the next cell they hadn't had their trial yet, but by next Sun- 
day they would be out. 

So I went from cell to cell, and I never found so many inno- 
cent men in one day in my life. The only guilty ones, they said, 
were the officers who put them there. So you say to-night, " I'm 
not lost, but the man in the seat next behind me is." You are 
drawing the rags of self-righteousness around you, and think you 
are not bad. But God says, " He that breaks the least of these 
commandments is guilty of all." If you were taken away, what 
would become of your soul ? Every soul that is not born of God 
shall be lost for time and eternity. Don't let the infidels make you 
believe you are all right. Well, I went on through the cells, and 
at last, in one, I saw a man sitting with his head resting on his 
hands, and I could see tears falling from his eyes. 



262 CHRIST'S MISSION TO THE WORLD. 

I asked him what Ms trouble was. He said, " My sins are 
greater than I can bear." And I said, " Thank God for that ! " 
And he says, " Thank God for that ? Ain't you the man's that's 
been preaching to us ? " " Yes," I said ; " I'm your friend, and I 
am glad you feel your sins." " Well," he says, " you are a queer 
friend." And I said, " If your sins are more than you can bear, 
you can cast them on One who is able to bear them. I've been 
hunting for you a long time." " What ?" he says ; " hunting for 
me ! " And I said, " You are lost, and I am glad I have found one 
man who will admit that he is lost." And I preached Christ to 
him. I told him of Him who came to seek and save the lost, who 
came to open the prison doors and set the captive free, who gives 
life and light and peace and joy. I must have talked to him for 
half an hour, and then I said I would pray with him. 

HAPPIEST OF ALL MEN. 

So we knelt down, I on the outside and he on the inside. And 
after I had prayed I said, " Now you pray." And he said it would 
be blasphemy for him to pray. But I told him that the blood of 
Jesus Christ cleansed from all sin, and he bowed his head down to 
the floor, and could only say, without so much as lifting his eyes 
toward heaven, " God be merciful to me, a poor, miserable wretch." 
No man sends up such a cry that God doesn't hear him. And I 
put my hand through the little window and I felt a tear drop on it ; 
and I said, "111 be praying for you to-night between 9 and 10 
o'clock at the hotel, and I want you to meet me at the Throne of 
Grace." 

That night it seemed as if the Spirit of God came upon me. I 
went to see him next morning, and the moment my eyes rested on 
him I saw a great change. Remorse and despair were gone, and 
the light from yon world had come upon him. He seemed to me 
to be the happiest man in this city. He said, " I thought I could 
never bear to see my old friends, but God came and set my soul free. 
I think it was about midnight. I cried and he heard me, and I am 
happy." 



CHAPTER XVI. 

The Victory of Faith. 

WENTIKTH verse of the fifth chapter of Luke: "When he 
s^) saw their faith." A little while before this Christ had been 
driven out of Nazareth, in his native town, and had come 
down to Capernaum to live, and He had begun His ministry, and 
some- mighty miracles had already been wrought in Capernaum. 
A little while before this, one of the officers in King Herod's army 
had a son who had been restored. Peter's wife's mother, that lay 
sick with the fever, had been healed, and Mark tells us that the 
whole city was moved, that they had come to the door of the house 
where He was sitting, the whole city bringing their sick. 

In fact, there was a great revival in Capernaum. That is 
what it was, and it is all it was. The news was spreading far and 
near. Everybody coming out of Capernaum was taking out 
tidings of what this mighty preacher was doing, and His mighty 
miracles, and the sayings that were constantly falling from His 
lips. And we read in a few verses before this 20th verse, that a 
man full of leprosy had come to Him and said: "Lord, if Thou 
canst, make me clean," and I want to call your attention to the 
difference between a man that had the palsy and the man that had 
the leprosy. 

The man with the palsy had friends who had faith. The man 
who had the leprosy had no friends who believed he could be 
cleansed. There had been no leper cleansed for 800 years, and 
we read back in the days of Elisha that there was a leper that 
was cleansed, but none since that time until now. Here is a leper 
that has faith and goes right straight to the Son of God Himself; 
and I want to say if there is a poor sinner here to-night that has 
not got any friends that would pray for him, you can go right 
straight to Jesus Himself. You don't need any Bishop or priest 

5>63 



264 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 

or potentate to intercede. Right away to Christ came this pool 
leper. He said: "If Thon will, Thon canst make me clean." 

There is faith for you. He did not say, like the man in the 
9th chapter of Mark: "If thon canst do anything for us, have 
compassion." He put the "if" in the wrong place; bnt this leper 
said, "If Thon wilt, Thon canst do it." It pleased the Lord, and 
He said: "I will. Be thon clean," and away went the leprosy. 
He was made well in a minnte, and of course this news had gone 
out of Capernaum, and not only the city was stirred, but the 
country also, and now we read that they were coming up from all 
parts of Judea, from Galilee and all the villages, and even from 
Jerusalem. 

CAME OUT OF CURIOSITY. 

The news had reached Jerusalem, and the Pharisees and 
philosophers and wise men, were coming up to this northern town 
to see what this great revival meant. They didn't come up to get 
a blessing. Like a great many who come to these meetings, they 
came out of curiosity. They came to see how it was that this 
man was performing such mighty miracles, and they were told 
that He was in the house. There they were sitting around the 
Master, and we are told the power of the Lord was present to heal 
them. But it don't say that they were healed. They didn't think 
that they were sick and needed a Saviour. 

Like hundreds now that are drawing around them their filthy 
rags of self-righteousness, they think they are good enough 
without salvation, and they just come here to reason out the 
philosophy of the meeting, and how it is so many people come 
together night after night to hear this old Gospel, which has been 
preached 1800 years. "And the power of the Lord was present 
to heal them." I have thought a number of times what a glorious 
thing it would have been if the}' had all been healed. What a 
glorious thing if those men coming out of Judea had been con- 
verted and gone back to publish the glad tidings in their homes 
and villages. What a revival it would have been. But the}' 
didn't come for that purpose, but only to reason out the thing. 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 26S 

But while these things were being done, suddenly a noise was 
leard overhead. The people heard a noise on the roof and looked 
up to see what was the matter. Now, there were four men in Caper- 
naum — I have an idea they were young converts — who found a man 
who had the palsy, and they could not get him to Jesus. Matthew, 
Mark and Luke all three give an account, but don't one of them say 
that the man himself had any faith. I can imagine these four men 
said to the man with the palsy, " If we can get you to Jesus all He 
has to do is to speak and the palsy is gone." And I see these four 
men making arrangements to take this man with the palsy away to 
Christ. They prepared a couch something like the stretcher we had 
in the war, and I see these four men each one taking his place to 
carry that couch through the streets of Capernaum. They go with 
a firm step and steady thread. They are moving toward that house 
where Christ is. These men have confidence. They know that 
the Son of God has power to heal this man, and they say, "If we 
can only get him to Jesus, the work will be done ; " and while these 
philosophers and scribes and wise men were there, trying to reason 
out the philosophy of the thing, these men arrived at the door, 
and for the crowd could not get in. 

FAITH STOPS AT NO OBSTACLES. 

They undoubtedly asked some of the men to come out and let 
this man with the palsy in ; but they could not get them out, and 
there they are. But faith looks over obstacles. Faith is not going 
to surrender. Now these men felt they must get in in some way, and 
I can imagine they went to one of the neighbors and asked them, 
"Just allow us to use your stairway. Here is a man that has the 
leprosy and we want to get him in," and I see the men taking this 
man up, and at last they get him upon the roof of the house where 
Christ is preaching ; and now you can hear them ripping up the 
roof, and everybody looks up to see what the noise is ; and at last 
they see that while Christ is preaching these four men are making 
a hole large enough to let a man down through. 

He must have been a good man, or he would have complained 
to see his roof torn up in that way. But these men wanted to get 



266 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 

the leper cleansed. That was worth more than the roof. They 
wanted to get the man blessed. They let the man right down into 
the presence of these Pharisees and Scribes. It would have been 
like letting him down into an ice-house if Christ had not been there. 
Those Scribes and Pharisees — the}' didn't have any compassion ; 
they didn't have any sympathy for the fallen ; they didn't have any 
sympathy for the erring. There was One who had sympathy for 
the man who was suffering. The}' laid him right down at the feet 
of Jesus. 

GOOD CHEER FOR THE POOR SUFFERER. 

My friends, you can't take palsied souls to a better place than 
to the feet of Jesus. They called upon the crowd to stand aside and 
make room, and they just placed him at the feet of Jesus. Christ 
looks up, and when He saw their faith — not the man's faith ; it 
don't say that he had any — He saw their faith — that's the point. I 
believe that that whole miracle is to teach us, that that whole lesson 
is to teach us Christians that God will honor our faith. I see the 
Son of God looking up at those four men who laid this leper down. 
He looked up yonder and saw their faith. There is nothing on this 
earth that pleases Him so much as faith. Wherever He finds faith 
it pleases Him. Twice Christ marvelled. I believe Christ mar- 
velled only twice. Once He marvelled at the faith of the Centurion, 
and He marvelled at the unbelief of the Jews. 

When He saw their faith. He said to the man looking down at 
Him, "Be of good cheer ; thy sins are forgiven. M Why, he didn't 
come for that ; he only expected to get rid of his palsy ; he didn't 
expect to have his sins forgiven. These men begun to look around 
with amazement. "That is a very- grievous charge; He forgives 
sin. What right has he to do that ? It is God and God alone who 
does that." I tell you the Jews to a man didn't believe in the 
divinity of Jesus Christ. They began to reason among themselves, 
but Christ knew what they were thinking about. He could read 
their thoughts. Christ said to them, "Is it easier for me to say to 
the man, ' His sins be forgiven,' or for me to say, ' Rise up and 
walk V Xow that you may know that the Son of Man hath power 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 207 

to forgive sins, I say, l Rise up and walk.' " Now the man was a 
leper. He hadn't the power to rise, but he leaps up in a minute. 
He packs up that old bed that he had lain on for years, and away 
he goes The man walks out with his bed on his back, and away he 
goes home. 

The men began to look at one another with amazement, and 
one and another said, " We have seen strange things to-day." How 
long did it take the Lord Jesus Christ to heal that man ? Some i 
men say, " Oh, we don't believe in instantaneous conversions." How 
long did it take the Lord to heal the man of the leprosy ? One 
word, and away went the leprosy. One word and the man stood 
up, and he rolled his bed up, and away he went on his way home. 
I should like to have seen his wife. I can imagine she was about 
as surprised as any woman you ever saw. 

FOUR CAN DO WHAT ONE CANNOT. 

But now the word I want to call your attention to is this : 
" When He saw their faith." Now, there are a great many men 
that don't have any faith in the Gospel at all. They don't believe 
in that Bible. There are a great many men in this city who are 
infidels. There are a great many skeptics. There is one thing 
that encourages me very much. The Lord can honor our faith and 
raise those men. " When He saw their faith." Suppose a man 
should goto the house of his neighbor, and say, " Come, let us take 
neighbor Levi to neighbor Peter's house ; Christ is there, and we 
can get him healed," and the two found they weren't able to carry 
the man, so they got three, and the three weren't able, so they got 
the fourth. 

Now I don't know of anything that would make a man get up 
quicker than to have four people combining to try to bring him to 
Christ. Suppose one man calls upon him after breakfast ; he doesn't 
think much about it ; he has had some one invite him to Christ i 
before. Suppose before dinner the second man comes, and says, " I 
want to lead you to Christ. I want to introduce you to the Son of 
God." The man has got quite aroused now ; perhaps he has never 
had the subject presented to him by two different men in one day. 



268 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 

But the third man has come, and the man has got thoroughly 
aroused by this time, and he says to himself, " Why, I never 
thought so much about my soul as I have to-day." But before 
the man gets to bed at night the fourth man has come, and I will 
guarantee that he won't sleep much that night — four men trying 
to bring him to Christ. If we can't bring our friends to Christ, 
let us get others to help us. If four men won't do it, let us add 
the fifth, and the Lord will see our faith, and the Lord will honor 
our faith, and we will see them brought to the Son of God. 

A SISTER'S LETTER. 

When I was at Nashville during our late war, I was closing the 
noon prayer-meeting and a great strong man came up to me, trem- 
bling from head to foot. He took a letter out of his pocket and 
wanted to have me read it. It was a letter from his sister. The 
sister stated in that letter that every night as the sun went down 
she went down on her knees to pray for him. The sister was six 
hundred miles away, and said the soldier, "I never thought of my 
soul until last night. I have stood before the cannon's mouth and 
it never made me tremble, but, sir, I haven't slept a wink since I 
got that letter." I think there is many a Christian here who 
understands what that letter meant. The Lord had seen her faith. 
It was God honoring faith, and it was God answering prayer. 

And so, my friends, if God sees our faith, these friends that 
we are anxious for will be brought to Christ. When we were in 
Edinburgh a man came to me and said, " Over yonder is one of 
our most prominent infidels in Edinburgh. I wish you would go 
over and see him." I took my seat beside him, and I asked him 
if he was a Christian. He laughed at me and said he didn't 
believe in the Bible. " Well," said I, after talking for some time, 
" will you let me pray with you ? Will you let me pray for you ? " 
"Yes," said he, "just pray, and see if God will answer your 
prayer. Now let the question be decided." "Will you kneel?'' 
"No, I won't kneel. Whom am I going to kneel before?" He 
said it with considerable sarcasm. 

I got down and prayed beside the infidel. He sat very straight, 









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THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 269 

so that the people should understand that he was not in sympathy at 
all with my prayer. After I got through I said, " Well, my friend, 
I believe that God will answer my prayer, and I want you to let 
me know when you are saved." u Yes, I will let you know when 
I am saved," all with considerable sarcasm. At last up at Wick, at 
a meeting in the open air, one night on the outskirts of the crowd 
I saw the Edinburgh infidel. He said, "Didn't I tell you God 
wouldn't answer your prayer?" I said, " The Lord will answer my 
prayer yet." I had a few minutes' conversation with him and left 
him, and just a year ago this month, when we were preaching in 
Liverpool, I got a letter from one of the leading pastors of Edin- 
burgh stating that the Edinburgh infidel had found his way to 
Christ and found the Lord. He wrote an interesting letter, saying 
how God had saved him. 

GOD'S POWER TO SAVE. 

And there may be many in this city who will laugh at this 
idea, and they will cavil, and perhaps they will say to-night that 
God don't answer prayer ; but he does, if Christians will only 
have faith. God can save the greatest infidel, the greatest skeptic, 
the greatest drunkard. What we want is to have faith. Oh, let 
that word sink down deep into the heart of every Christian here 
to-night, and let us show our faith by our works. 

Let us go out and bring all our friends here, and if there is 
poor preaching, we can bring down from heaven the necessary 
blessings without good preaching. One evening a skeptic came in 
just out of curiosity. He wanted to see the crowd, and he hadn't 
more than crossed the threshold of the door before the spirit of 
God met him, and I asked him if there was anything in the ser- 
mon that influenced him, in hopes that I was going to get some- 
thing to encourage me ; but he could not tell what the text 
was. I asked him if it was the singing, but he didn't know what 
Mr. Sankey had sung. It was the power of God alone that con- 
verted him, and that is what we want in these meetings. 

If we have this power, when we invite our friends here the 
Lord will meet them and will answer prayer and save them. Let 

/ 



270 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 

us go and bring our unconverted friends here. All through the 
services let us be lifting up our hearts in prayer. God save our 
friend ! O God, convert him ! And in answer to our prayer the 
Lord will save them. 

While in London there was a man awa}^ off in India— a 
godly father — who had a son in London, and he got a furlough 
and came clear from India to London to see after his boy's spiritual 
welfare. Do you think God let that man come thus far without 
honoring that faith ? No. He converted that son, and that is the 
kind we want — where faith and works go together ; and if we have 
faith God will honor it and answer our prayer. Only a few years 
ago in the City of Philadelphia there was a mother that had two 
sons. They were just going as fast as they could to ruin. They 
were breaking her heart, and she went into a little prayer-meeting 
and got up and presented them for prayer. They had been on a 
drunken spree or had just started in that way, and she knew that 
their end would be a drunkard's grave, and she went among these 
Christians and said, " Won't you just ay to God for my two boys?" 

HAPPIEST HOME IN THE CITY. 

The next morning those two boys had made an appointment 
to meet each other on the corner of Market and Thirteenth Streets 
— though not that they knew anything about our meeting — and 
while one of them was there at the corner, waiting for his brother 
to come, he followed the people who were flooding into the depot 
building, and the spirit of the Lord met him, and he was wounded 
and found his way to Christ. After his brother came, he found the 
place too crowded to enter ; so he, too, went curiously into another 
meeting and found Christ, and went home happy ; and when he got 
home, he told his mother what the Lord had done for him ; and the 
second son came with the same tidings. 

I heard one get up afterward to tell his experience in the 
young converts' meeting ; and he had no sooner told the story than 
the other got up and said : " I am that brother, and there is not a 
happier home in Philadelphia than w* 3 have got ;" and they went 
out, bringing their friends to Christ. 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 271 

Let us now show our faith by our works. Let us away to our 
friends, to our neighbors, and to those we have an influence over, 
and let us talk about Christ, and let us plead with God that they 
may be converted, and instead of there being a few thousands con- 
verted in this city, tens of thousands can be converted ; and let our 
prayers go up to God in our homes and around our family altars. 
Let the prayers go up, " O God, save my unconverted husband." 
" O God, save my unconverted wife." " O God, save my uncon- 
verted children," and God will hear that cry. As I was coming 
out of a daily prayer-meeting in one of our Western cities, a 
mother came up to me and said, " I want to have you see my hus- 
band and ask him to come to Christ." I took out my memorandum 
book, and I put down his name. She says, " I want to have you 
go and see him." I knew the name and that it was a learned judge, 
and so said to her, " I can't argue with him. He is a good deal 
older than I am, and it would be out of place. Then I am not 
much for infidel argument." " Well, Mr. Moody," she says, " that 
ain't what he wants. He's got enough of that. Just ask him to 
come to the Saviour." She urged me so hard and so strong, that I 
consented to go. 

JUDGE THOUGHT HIS VISITOR FOOLISH. 

I went up to the office where the judge was doing business, 
and told him what I had come for. He laughed at me. " You are 
very foolish," he said, and began to argue with me. I said, " I 
don't think it will be profitable for me to hold an argument with you. 
I have just one favor I want to ask of you, and that is that when 
you are converted you will let me know." " Yes," said he, " I will 
do that. When I am converted I will let you know " — with a good 
deal of sarcasm. I thought the prayers of that wife would be 
answered if mine were not. 

A year and a half after I was in that city, and a servant 
came to my door and said : " There is a man in the drawing- 
room." I found the judge there. He said : " I promised I 
would let you know when I was converted." I had heard it 
from other lips, but I wanted to hear it from his own. He said 



272 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 

his wife had gone out to a meeting one night and he was home 
alone, and while he was sitting there by the fire he thought, 
" Supposing my wife is right, and my children are right ; sup- 
pose there is a heaven and hell, and I shall be separated from 
them." His first thought was, " I don't believe a word of it." 

PRIDE WAS FINALLY OVERCOME. 

The second thought came, " You believe in the God that cre- 
ated you, and that the God that created you is able to teach you. 
You believe that God can give you life." " Yes, the God that cre- 
ated me can give me life. I was too proud to get down on my 
knees by the fire, and I said, ' O God, teach me.' And as I prayed, 
I don't understand it, but it began to get very dark, and my heart 
got very heavy. I was afraid to tell my wife, and I pretended to be 
asleep. She kneeled down beside that bed, and I knew she was 
praying for me. I kept crying, ' O God, teach me.' I had to change 
my prayer, ' O God, save me ; O God, take away this burden.' But 
it grew darker and darker, and the load grew heavier and heavier. 
All the way to my office I kept crying, 'O God, take away this load.' 
I gave my clerks a holiday, and just closed my office and locked the 
door. I fell down on my face ; I cried in agony to my Lord, ' O 
Lord, for Christ's sake, take away this guilt.' I don't know how it 
was, but it began to grow very light. I said, I wonder if this isn't 
what they call conversion. I think I will go and ask the minister 
if I am not converted." 

The old judge said to me : " Mr. Moody, I have enjoyed life 
in the last three months more than all put together." The judge 
did not believe, the wife did, and God honored her faith and saved 
that man. And he went up to Springfield, 111., and the old judge 
stood up there and told those politicians what God, for Christ's sake, 
had done for him. And now let this text sink down deep into 
your hearts : " When He saw their faith." Let us lift up our hearts 
to God in prayer that he may give us faith. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Courage and Enthusiasm. 

T SHALL take for my subject to-night only two words, Courage 
X and Enthusiasm — necessary qualifications for successful work 

in the Lord's service. In this chapter, Josh, i., I read to-night 
four different times God tells Joshua to be of good courage, and He 
says that if he was of good courage no man should be able to stand 
before him all the days of his life. And we read that in the even- 
ing of his life he was successful, and that no man was able to stand 
before him all his days. God fulfilled His promise. God kept 
His word. But see how careful God is to instruct him on this one 
point. Four times in one chapter he says to him, " Be of good 
courage, and then you shall prosper ; then you shall have good 
success." 

And I have yet to find that God ever uses a man that is all the 
time looking on the dark side, and is all the time talking about the 
obstacles and looking at them, and is discouraged and cast down. 
It is not these. Christians that go around with their head down like 
a bulrush, looking at the obstacles and talking about the darkness 
all the time, that God uses. They kill everything they touch. 
There is no life in them. Now if we are going to succeed we have 
got to be of good courage, and the moment we get our eyes on God 
and remember who He is, and that He has all power in heaven 
and earth, and that it is God who commands us to work in His 
vineyard, then it is that we will have courage given us. 

Now if you just take your Bibles and look carefully through 
them you will see the men that have left their mark behind them ; 
the men that have been successful in winning souls to Christ have 
all been men of that stamp. You will notice that when Moses com- 
menced, after he had been among the Egyptians forty years, he 
thought the time had come for him to commence his work of deliv- 
ering the captives, and he went out, and the first thing we hear is 
18 273 



274 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 

that lie was looking this way and that way to see if somebody 
called him. 

He was not fit for God's work. God had to take him on the 
back side of the desert for forty years, and then God was ready to 
send him, and Moses then looked but one way. And He sent him 
down into Egypt, and he had courage and God could use him. But 
it took him forty years to learn that lesson, that he must have 
courage and boldness to be a fit vessel for the Master's use. 

THE PROPHET OF MOUNT CARMEL. 

Again we find Elijah on Mount Carmel, full of boldness. 
How the Lord used him ! How the Lord stood by him ! How the 
Lord blessed him ! But when he got his eyes off the way, and 
Jezebel sent a message to him that she would have his life, he got 
afraid. He was not afraid of Ahab and the whole royalty, and he 
was not afraid of the whole nation. He stood on Mount Carmel 
alone, and see what courage he had and admiration. But what 
came over him I don't know, unless it was that he got his eyes off 
the Lord, and when one woman gave him that message he got 
frightened, and God had to go to him and ask him what he was 
doing ; and he was not fit for God's communion. 

That, I think, is the trouble with a good many of God's people. 
We get frightened, and are afraid to speak to men about their souls. 
We lack moral courage, and if we hear the voice of God speaking 
to us and saying, " Run and speak to that young man," we will go 
to him meaning to do it, and will really talk to him about everything 
else, and dare not about his soul. When we begin to invite them 
to Christ is when the work begins, and it v/on't begin until we have 
the courage given us and are ready to go and speak with them 
about their souls. We read that when the apostles were brought 
before the council they perceived their boldness, and it made an 
impression on the council. The Lord could use them then, because 
they were fearless and bold. 

Look at Peter on Pentecost, when he charged the murder of 
the Son of God upon the Jews. A little while before he had got 
out of communion, and one little maid had scared him nearly out 



COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 275 

of his life, so that he swore he didn't know Christ. Ah ! he had 
his eyes off the Master, and the moment we get our eyes off Christ 
we get disheartened, and then God cannot use us. 

I remember a few years ago I got discouraged and could not 
see much fruit of my work ; and one morning, as I was in my study, 
cast down, one of my Sabbath school teachers came in and wanted 
to know what I was discouraged about, and I told him, because I 
could see no result of my work ; and speaking about Noah, he said : 
" By the way, did you ever study up the character of Noah ? " I felt 
that I knew all about that, and told him that I was familiar with it, 
and he said, " Now, if you never studied that carefully, you ought 
to do it, for I cannot tell you what a blessing it has been to me." 

WORKED A HUNDRED YEARS. 

When he went out I took down my Bible and commenced to 
read about Noah, and the thought came stealing over me, " Here is 
a man that toiled and worked a hundred years and didn't get 
discouraged ; if he did, the Holy Ghost didn't put it on record," and 
the clouds lifted, and I got up and said, if the Lord wants me to 
work without any fruit I will work on. I went down to the noon 
prayer-meeting, and when I saw the people coming to pray I said 
to myself, " Noah worked a hundred years, and he never saw a 
prayer-meeting outside of his own family." Pretty soon a man got 
up right across the isle where I was sitting, and said he had come 
from a little town where there had been a hundred uniting with 
the Church of God the year before. And I thought to myself, 
"What if Noah had heard that! He preached so many, many 
years and didn't get a convert, yet he was not discouraged." Then 
a man got up right behind me, and he trembled as he said, "I am 
lost. I want you to pra}' for my soul." And I said, "What if 
Noah had heard that! He worked a hundred and twenty years, 
and never had a man come to him and say that; and yet he didn't 
get discouraged." 

And I made up my mind then, that, God helping me, I would 
never get discouraged. I would do the best I could, and leave the 
results with God, and it has been a wonderful help to me. And so 



276 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 

let me say to the Christians here that we must expect good results, 
and never get discouraged; but if we don't get good results, let us 
not look on the dark side, but keep on praying, and in the fulness 
of time the blessing of God will come. What we want is to have 
the Christians come out and take their stand. I find a great many 
professed Christians for a long time ashamed to acknowledge that 
they have been quickened. Some have said they did not like the 
idea of asking Christians to rise, as I did last evening. 

THE WOMAN WITH HER POKER. 

Now, if we are going to be successful, we have got to take our 
stand for God, and let the world and every one know we are on the 
Lord's side. I have great respect for the woman that started out 
during the war with a poker. She heard the eneni}- were coming 
and went to resist them. When some one asked her what she 
could do with the poker, she said she would at least let them know 
what side she was on. And that is what we want, and the time is 
coming when the line must be drawn in this cit}^, and those on 
Christ's side must take their stand, and the moment we come out 
boldly and acknowledge Christ, it is that men will begin to inquire 
what they must then do to be saved. 

Then there is a class of people that are not warm enough. I 
don't think a little enthusiasm would hurt the Church at the 
present time. I think we need it. I know the world will cr}^ out 
against it. Business men will cr}^ out against religious enthu- 
siasm. Let railroad stocks go up fifteen or twent}^ per cent., and 
see what a revival there would be in business. If there should be 
a sudden advance in stocks, see if there wouldn't be enthusiasm 
on 'Change to-morrow. Let there be a sudden change in business, 
and see if there isn't a good deal of enthusiasm on the street. 
We can have enthusiasm in business, we can have enthusiasm in 
politics, and no one complains of that. A man can have enthu- 
siasm in everything else, but the moment that a little fire gets 
into the church they raise the cry, "Ah, enthusiasm — false excite- 
ment — I am afraid of it." I do not want false excitement, but I 
do think we want a little fire, a little holy enthusiasm. 



COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 277 

But these men will raise the cry, "Zeal without knowledge." 
I had a good deal rather have zeal without knowledge than knowl- 
edge without zeal, and it won't hurt us to have a little more of this 
enthusiasm and zeal in the Lord's work. I saw more zeal when 
I was in Princeton last Sunday than I have in many a year. I 
was talking to the students there about their souls, and after I 
had been talking for some time, quite a group of young men 
gathered around me, and the moment that one of them made a 
surrender and said, "Well, I will accept Christ," it seems as if 
there were twenty-five hands pressed right down to shake hands 
with him. That is what we want — men that will rejoice to 
hear of the conversion of men. 

HEART ON FIRE FOR LIBERTY. 

Although I don't admire his ideas, I do admire the enthusiasm 
of that man Garibaldi. It is reported that when he marched 
toward Rome in 1867, they took him up and threw him into prison, 
and he sat right down and wrote to his comrades, "If fifty Gari- 
baldis are thrown into prison let Rome be free." That is the 
spirit. Who is Garibaldi ? That is nothing. " If fifty Garibaldis 
are thrown into prison let Rome be free." That is what we want 
in the cause of Christ. We have got to work, and not be loiter- 
ing at our ease. And then the question of dignity comes up. 
We have got to lay all that aside, and we have got to be helpers. 
What difference does it make whether we are hewers of wood or 
carriers of water while the Temple of God is being erected ? Yes, 
let us have an enthusiasm in the Church of God. If we had it in 
a few of the churches, I believe it would be like a resurrection. 
The people would say, "What has come over this man? he ain't 
like the same man he was two months ago." We want to have 
them say, " The Son of God is dearer to us than our money. The 
Son of God is dearer to us than our familes. The Son of God is 
dearer to us than our position in society." 

Let us do anything that the work of God may go on, and when 
we get there God will bless us. Why, it says in the Bible, " One 
shall chase a thousand." We have not got many of that kind in 



278 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 

our churches. I wish we had more of them. It says, " Two 
shall put ten thousand to flight." Now, if a few should lay hold of 
God in this way, see what a great army ere long will be saved in 
this city ! But then we have got to be men after God's own heart. 
We cannot be lukewarm ; we have got to be on fire with the cause 
of Christ. We have got to have more of this enthusiasm that will 
carry us into the Lord's work. If there is going to be a great 
revival here, it aint going to be in this hall. It has got to be done 
by one and another going around and talking to their neighbors. 

WOULD DIE BUT NEVER SURRENDER. 

There isn't a skeptic, there isn't a drunkard, but what can be 
reclaimed if we come with desire in our hearts. We musn't go 
around professionally if we want to see an}^ result. There is a 
story told in history in the ninth century, I believe, of a young 
man that came up with a little handful of men to attack a king who 
had a great army of three thousand men. The young man had 
five hundred, and the king sent a messenger to the young man, 
saying that he need not fear to surrender, for he would treat him 
mercifully. The young man called up one of his soldiers and 
said : " Take this dagger and drive it to your heart ; " and the 
soldier took the dagger and drove it to his heart. And calling up 
another, he said to him, " Leap into yonder chasm," and the man 
leaped into the chasm. 

The young man then said to the messenger, " Go back and 
tell your King I have got 500 men like these. We will die, but 
we will never surrender. And tell your King another thing, that 
I will have him chained with my dog inside of half an hour." 
And when the King heard that, he did not dare to meet them, and 
his army fled before them like chaff before the wind, and within 
twenty-four hours he had that King chained with his dog. 

That is the kind of zeal we want< " We will die but we will 
never surrender." We will work until Jesus comes, and then we 
will rise with Him. O, if men are willing to die for patriotism, 
why can they not have the same zeal for Christ ? All that Abra- 
ham Lincoln had to do, was to call for men, and how speedily they 



COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 279 

came. When lie called for 600,000 men how quick they sprang 
up all over the nation. Are not souls worth more than this 
republic ? Are not souls worth more than this government ? 
Don't we want 600,000 men ? If 600 men should come forward 
whose hearts were right red-hot for the Son of God, we would be 
able to see what mighty results would follow. "One man shall 
chase a thousand, and two shall put ten thousand to flight." 

THE WHOLE ARMY SHOULD ADVANCE. 

During our war, the generals that were all the time on the 
defensive, never succeeded. The generals that were successful, 
were the generals that were on the aggressive. Some of our 
churches think they are doing remarkably well if they hold their 
membership, and they think if they have thirty or forty conver- 
sions in that church during the year, that that is remarkable work. 
They think it is enough to supply the places of those who have 
died and those who have wandered away during the past. It seems 
to me we ought to bring thousands and thousands to Christ. I say 
the time has come for us to have a war on the side of aggression. 
There may be barriers in our path, but God can remove them. 
There may be a mountain in our way, but God can take us over the 
mountain. There may be difficulties in the way, but He can over- 
come them. 

Our God is above them all, and if the Church of God is ready 
to advance, all obstacles will be removed. No man ever sent by 
God ever failed, but self must be lost sight of. We must be willing 
to lay down our lives for the cause of Christ. 

When I was going to Europe in 1867, my friend Mr. Stuart, 
of Philadelphia, said, " Be sure to be at the General Assembly in 
Edinburgh, in June. I was there last year," said he, " and it did 
me a world of good." He said that a returned missionary from 
India was invited to speak to the General Assembly on the wants 
of India. 

This old missionary, after a brief address, told the pastors who 
were present, to go home and stir up their churches and send young 
men to India to preach the gospel. He spoke with such earnest- 



280 COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 

ness, that after a while he fainted, and they carried him from the 
hall. When he recovered he asked'where he was, and they told 
him the circnmstances nnder which he had been brought there. 
" Yes," he said, " I was making a plea for India, and I didn't quite 
finish my speech, did I ? " After being told that he did not, he said, 
" Well, take me back and let me finish it." But they said, " No, 
you will die in the attempt." " Well," said he, " I will die if I 
don't," and the old man asked again that they would allow him to 
finish his plea. When he was taken back the whole congregation 
stood as one man, and as they brought him on the platform, with 
a trembling voice he said : ' ' Fathers and mothers of Scotland, is it 
true that you will not let your sons go to India ? I spent twenty- 
five years of my life there. I lost my health, and I have come back 
with sickness and shattered health. If it is true that we have 
no strong grandsons to go to India, I will pack up what I have 
and be off to-morrow, and I will let those heathen know that if I 
cannot live for them I will die for them." 

GRAND WORK OF AN OLD WOMAN. 

The world will say that that old man was enthusiastic. Well, 
that is just what we want. No doubt that is what they said of the 
Son of God when he was down here. O, that God may baptize us 
to-night with the spirit of enthusiasm ! That He may anoint us 
to-night with the Holy Ghost ! Let me say to some of you men — 
I see some gray locks here, who I have no doubt are saying, " I 
wish I was young again ; I would like to help in this work. I would 
like to work for the Lord." 

When we went to London there was an old woman, eighty-five 
years old, who came to the meetings and said she wanted a hand in 
that work. She was appointed to a district, and called on all classes 
of people. She went to places where we would probably have been 
put out, and told people of Christ. There were none that could 
resist her. When the old woman, eighty-five years old, came to 
them and offered to pray for them, they all received her kindly—- 
Catholics, Jews, Gentiles, all. That is enthusiasm. That is what 
we want here. If you cannot give a day to this work, give an hour. 



COURAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 281 

or if not an hour five minutes. If you have not strength to do 
anything personally, you can pray for this work. 

Now, it is a good deal better to do that than it is to stand off 
criticising. Some will say, " O, I heard my grandfather say how 
such things should be done. This is not managed right to be suc- 
cessful." And they stand off and criticise and find fault, and we 
will never succed as long as they do this. All should work and ask 
God's guidance. 

THE FIREMAN AND CHILD. 

Once, when a great fire broke out at midnight and people 
thought that all the inmates had been taken out, way up there in 
the fifth story, was seen a little child, crying for help. Up went 
a ladder, and soon a fireman was seen ascending to the spot. As 
he neared the second story the flames burst in fury from the 
windows, and the multitude almost despaired of the rescue of the 
child. The brave man faltered, and a comrade at the bottom cried 
out, "Cheer!" and cheer upon cheer arose from the crowd. Up 
the ladder he went and saved the child, because they cheered him. 
If you cannot go into the heat of the battle yourself, if you cannot 
go into the harvest field and work day after day, you can cheer 
those that are working for the Master. 

I see many old people in their old days, get crusty and sour, 
and they discourage every one they meet by their fault-finding. 
That is not what we want. If we make a mistake come and tell 
us of it, and we will thank you. You don't know how much you 
may do by j ust speaking kindly to those that are willing to work. 
I remember when I was a boy I went several miles from home 
with an older brother. That seemed to me the longest visit of my 
life. It seemed that I was then further away from home than I 
had ever been before, or have ever been since. 

While we were walking down the street we saw an old man 
coming toward us, and my brother said, " There is a man that will 
give you a cent. He gives every new boy that comes into this 
town a cent." That was my first visit to the town, and when the 
old man got opposite to us he looked around, and my brother not 



282 COUEAGE AND ENTHUSIASM. 

wishing me to lose the cent and to remind the old man that I had 
not received it, told him that I was a new 003- in the town. The 
old man, taking off my hat, placed his trembling hand on my 
head, and told me I had a Father in heaven. It was a kind, simple 
act, bnt I feel the pressure of the old man's hand upon my head 
to-day. 

Now you can all do something in this work of saving souls. 
That is what we have come to this city for. There is not a mother, 
a father, nor wife, there is not a young man in all the city, but 
what ought to be in sympathy with this work. We have come 
here to tr}^ to save souls. I never heard of one that was brought 
to Christ that it injured them. Oh, let us pray for the Spirit of 
God; let us pray that this spirit of criticism and of fault-finding 
may be all laid aside, and that we may be of one spirit, as they 
were on the day of Pentecost. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

Confessing Christ. 

AST night I spoke to you about believing. I want to follow 
that subject to-night with another subject as important, and 
that is Confession of Christ ; not confessing sin, that is not 
what I want to talk about to-night, but confessing Christ. In 
the ioth chapter of Romans, ioth verse — a very little verse — 
you will find these words : ' ' For with the heart man believeth unto 
righteousness ; and with the mouth confession is made unto salva- 
tion.'' I believe there are a great many people who have got into 
trouble and difficulty right in the middle of that verse, because 
they do not understand why it is that they do not have the joy 
they have heard other Christian people talk about. They say they 
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ ; they say they trust Him, and 
Him alone, for salvation ; they say that Christ is their only hope ; 
but there they stop. 

Now I say to you that confession is as important as faith. 
" With the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the 
mouth confession is made unto salvation.' 7 Then the next verse 
says, " For the Scripture sayeth, Whosoever believeth on Him shall 
not be ashamed." Now, if a man really believes in his heart, the 
next thing he ought to do is to confess Christ, is it not ? And you 
won't get the blessing until you do. " With the mouth confession 
is made unto salvation." The fact of the matter is that we are all 
moral cowards ; we are ashamed to come out and confess Christ 
and take our stand on the Lord's side, and on the side of His 
religion. 

It is the only religion in the world that is worth having ; it is 
the only religion in the world that gives life to man ; but, strange 
to say, I believe we are the only people on earth who are ashamed 
of their religion. You cannot find a man who holds any false doc- 
trine of religion who is not proud of it. If a man has got hold of 

283 



284 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

an error he is not ashamed to confess it and acknowledge it to all 
men. A man who is in the service of Satan is not ashamed of it. 
Yon hear snch men swearing on the street, proclaiming who is their 
master every day ; they seem to be prond of the devil and to like 
to have every one know that they are servants of his. 

DUTY OF CONFESSION. 

But how do men confess their allegiance to Christ ? As disci- 
ples of Jesus what cowards we are ! It sometimes happens that 
those who have gone away from our meetings under the influence 
of a changed heart, come to me afterward and say that they are still 
in darkness. I say to them, there is a reason for this; did you con- 
fess Christ when you went home? " No, I thought I would wait 
and see how it would hold out before I told any one." But that is 
not the right way to do. You see it is with the heart man believeth, 
and the next step is to confess him with the mouth : that is what 
the mouth is for — to confess Christ ; to tell all that He has done 
for you. 

If a man is ashamed to do this, to take his stand on the Lord's 
side, he will not get the benefit of his conviction. In fact, it is con- 
fession unto salvation ; salvation comes when we take our stand for 
Jesus Christ before all the world. If I belonged to the Repub- 
lican party, and got tired and sick of it and wanted to join the 
Democratic party, I should not be ashamed to come out and ac- 
knowledge it. You never saw a man leave one party to join another 
who did not like to come out and let every one know it. They 
want to use all the influence they can to get their friends to join 
them. If a man is on the wrong side of this question of religion 
and goes over on the Lord's side, ought he not to be just as willing 
to publish it, and to make every one know that he is on the Lord's 
side ? Isn't it amazing how few there are who are ready to come 
out boldly and acknowledge to every one that they want to be on 
the Lord's side ? 

One thing that made our one o'clock meeting so interesting 
to-day was, a young man got up and said, "My sister and my 
mother are very anxious to have me become a Christian, and I 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 285 

myself want to." I said, " Thank God for that ; that man has more 
courage ; he is willing to let the world know that he wants to be on 
the Lord's side. " I never yet have seen a man who came out boldly in 
that way but that he surely turns out all right at last. Look at the 
9th chapter of Luke, the 23d verse: "And He said unto them 
all, If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself and take 
up his cross daily and follow me." 

TRYING TO GET TO HEAVEN WITHOUT A CROSS. 

But the cross is what men do not like ; they want to get to 
heaven without taking up the cross — any way but that. If men 
could buy salvation, they would be willing to pay a good price for 
it ; they would go round the world to get to heaven without the 
burden of the cross. The way to heaven is straight as an arrow ; 
it is perfectly straight. A man need not be in darkness about the 
way if he really wants to know. But on the way to heaven there 
is a cross, and if you try to go around it, or to step over it, or to do 
anything else than take it up and bear it onward, you get lost. 
When men are ready to follow Christ, to deny themselves, and 
humble themselves, and take up the cross, then salvation is ready 
for them. Satan puts a straw across our path and magnifies it and 
makes us believe it is a mountain, but all the devil's mountains are 
mountains of smoke ; when you come up to them they are not there, 
but mere mountains of smoke. 

Now there is nothing to hinder this whole audience from 
coming out on the Lord's side to-night, and confessing Jesus 
Christ to be their Saviour ; there is nothing but your will to prevent 
it. Satan has not the power to keep you from it if you will. 
Christ says, except a man become converted and like a little child 
he is not fit for the kingdom of God. Pride, I think, is the w T orst 
enemy we have. It keeps thousands of people out of the kingdom 
of God. The idea that we have to humble ourselves and become 
like a little child is too much for our pride, but, " whosoever shall 
save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose his life for My 
sake shall find it ; " but, " whosoever shall be ashamed of Me and 
of My word, of him shall the Son of Man be ashamed, when He 



286 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

shall come in His own glory and in His power, and amid all the 
angels." 

Ashamed of Him ! A young convert got np in one of our 
meetings and tried to preach ; he could not preach very well, either, 
but he did the best he could — but some one stood up and said, 
" Young man, you cannot preach ; you ought to be ashamed of 
yourself." Said the young man, " So I am, but I am not ashamed 
of my Lord." That is right, Do not be ashamed of Christ — of 
the man that bought us with His own blood. Ought we to be 
ashamed to speak for His cause, to take our stand on His side ? 
He might well be ashamed of us, for ten thousand reasons which 
I could show. 

But the idea of a poor, miserable, vile, blind, hell-deserving 
sinner being ashamed to own Christ ! It is the strangest thing in 
the world. Look in the 12th chapter of Luke, the 8th and 9th 
verses : " Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess Me 
before men, him shall the Son of Man also confess before the 
angels of God. But he that denieth Me before men shall be 
denied before the angels of God." 

PRAISE FOR HEROES. 

During our war, when a General had accomplished some great 
victory, or had any great success, he thought it was a great honor 
to have a man stand up in Congress and mention his name. But 
think of having your name mentioned in the Courts of Heaven, 
and not only that, but by the Prince of Heaven, by the King of 
Kings and Lord of Lords ! Think of Jesus speaking our names 
there ! He says to us, if you will not be ashamed of Me before 
men, in this old creation, I will not be ashamed of you in heaven 
before the angels, in the new creation. You confess Me here, I 
will confess you there. You deny Ale here, I will deny y^ou there. 

Will the Christian people in this room, in this assembly 
to-night, take their stand and let every one know in the circle of 
their family and among their acquaintances that they are on the 
Lord's side? Why, if you do, it would be the best meeting, a 
meeting of more satisfaction than any we have had. The results 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 287 

of such a course taken by every one here to-night would bring more 
to Jesus, and be productive of greater righteousness than any 
brought out by any previous assembly. Let you, young converts, 
tell your experience, take your stand and confess Christ. That is 
the way to show how strong your conversion is. Be sure you are 
on the Lord's side, " If the Lord be God, then follow Him." 

SURE SIGN OF A NEW LIFE. 

"But if Baal be God, then follow him." It is one of the surest 
signs of your genuine repentance to come out before men and 
confess the Lord Jesus Christ. Take your stand and be a witness 
to the Lord. " He that confesseth Me before men, the same will I 
also confess before the angels of heaven. But he that denieth Me 
before men the same will I also deny before My Father which is in 
heaven." I was in a Boston prayer-meeting a number of years 
ago — but I ought to say that I have lived for a number of years out 
West, a number of years in Chicago, and you know that that part 
of the country is made up principally of young men ; at any rate 
the prayer-meetings were for the most part made up of young 
men — hardly saw a gray-headed man in them at all. 

So, while I was in Boston, it was quite a treat to see old, gray- 
headed men in the assemblies. Well, in that meeting, a little, tow- 
headed Norwegian boy stood up. He could hardly speak a word of 
English plain ; but he got up and came to the front. He trembled 
all over, and the tears were all trickling down his cheeks ; but he 
spoke out as well as he could, and said : " If I tell the world about 
Jesus, then will He tell the Father about me." He then took his 
seat ; that was all he said ; but I tell you that in those few words, 
he said more than all of them — old and young — together. Those 
few words went straight down into the heart of every one present. 
" If I tell the world " — yes, that's what it means, to confess 
Christ. 

And now, are there not hundreds here to-night that are really 
ashamed of Christ — feel backwards after confessing that they are 
Christians ? I heard a story about two young men who came to 
the city from the country on a visit. They went to the same 



288 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

boarding-house to stay, and took a room together. Well, when 
they came to go to bed each felt ashamed to go down on his knees 
before his companion first. So there they sat watching each other. 
In fact, to express the situation in one word, they were both 
cowards — yes, cowards ! 

But at last one of them mustered up a little courage, but with 
burning blushes, as if he was about to do something wrong and 
wicked, he sunk down on his knees to say his prayers. As soon 
as the second saw that he also knelt. And then, after they had 
said their prayers, each waited for the other to get up. When they 
did manage to get up, one said to the other : " I really am glad 
to see that 3-011 knelt ; I was afraid of you." " Well," said the 
other, " and I was afraid of you." So it turned out that both were 
Christians, and yet they were afraid of each other. 

DON'T BE ASHAMED OF YOUR COLORS. 

You smile at that ; but how man3 7 times have you done the 
same thing — perhaps not in that way, but the same thing in effect ? 
Henceforth, then, be not ashamed ; but let every one know you are 
His. And I wish to say to the 3'oung converts here to-night that 
if yon want peace and joy flowing into your heart like a river, com- 
mence at once and confess Him. It is not a work of merit ; you 
are not making God a debtor to 3 t ou ; it is the very least you 
can do. And those who do so, come out boldly and confess 
Him, preach better and stronger than any minister of His. 
Each confession is worth more than a sermon ; it is like to one 
raised from the dead. 

The most powerful meeting we have ever had was that of 
last night, when the converts came boldly forth and told how 
they had been saved. I heard man3^ sa3^ that it was the best 
meeting they had attended. O, what meetings of sweetness and 
communion with God we would have if every one would just 
come out and do his duty as God wants him to do ! If we 
boldly took up our cross and bore it manful^, the world would 
soon see the influence of these meetings. 

When I was in Ireland, I heard of a man who got great 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 289 

blessing from God. He was a business man — a landed proprie- 
tor. He had a large family, and a great many men to work for 
him, taking care of his home. He came up to Dublin, and there 
he found Christ. And he came boldly out and thought he 
would go home and confess Him. He thought that if Christ 
had redeemed him w T ith His precious blood, the least he could 
do would be to confess Him, and tell about it sometimes. So 
he called his family together and his servants and, with tears 
running down his cheeks, he poured out his soul to them, and 
told them what Christ had done for him. 

RIGHT BY THE FIRESIDE. 

He took the Bible down from its resting-place and read a 
few verses of gospel. Then he went down on his knees to pray, 
and so greatly was the little gathering blessed, that four or five 
out of that family were convicted of sin ; they forsook the ways 
of the world and accepted Christ and eternal life. It was like 
unto the household of Cornelius, which experienced the like 
working of the Holy Spirit. And that man and his family were 
not afraid to follow out their professions. 

They were not like a great many men I have seen who accept 
Christ while there is no cross to bear, and where everything is plain 
and easy for them. Some men when they profess to accept Christ, 
immediately think they must go and join some church right away. 
So they go down and see the minister, and say : " Mr. So-and-So, I 
have become a Christian, and I want to take a pew in your church. 
I would like to be a member of your congregation, but I don't 
want to take any active part in the church. Now, don't ask me 
some evening to get up and tell my experience ; I never did any 
thing like that, and would not like to be pointed at so conspicuously." 

Well, he does join the church, and that is the last you ever 
hear of him. Last week, in this building, a man was converted, 
and he went right off and joined some church. Well, I hope after 
he did join, he didn't stop going to church. If a man is converted 
I want him to come here and give his experience — let the thousands 
hear that he is a child of God; let his testimony be given to 

19 



200 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

others, and the result may be that God will use his witnessing to 
the conversion of many. Mr. Sankey sang to-night, " Where are 
the Nine?" So may Christ ask the question, "Where are the 
Nine?" 

You have read of the story of the cleansing of ten lepers — 
you know how the God of glory had compassion upon them. His 
command was, " Go show yourself to the priests;" and so they 
went — behold, the leprosy was all gone. It must have been a won- 
derful sight. They are going along the road ; all at once one dis- 
covers the great change that has been wrought in him, rid he stops 
suddenly. " Brothers, my leprosy is gone," he cries : " I am per- 
fectly well, look." And another then sees his altered condition, 
and he cries out, " And I am well, too." And another, " Why 
see ! my fingers were nearly rotted off, and now the disease is all 
gone." 

ONE RETURNS TO GIVE GLORY TO GOD. 

So they all look at themselves and the great truth bursts upon 
them that they have been made well. Nine of them continue on 
their journey, but one poor man turns back, and falls at the feet 
of Jesus and glorifies God. Perhaps he did not find his Lord right 
away ; perhaps he had to search for Him ; but find Him he did, 
and gave him the glory. Christ after seeing him alone at His 
feet out of all He had conferred the great boon upon, asked in 
astonishment, "Were there not ten cleansed, but where are the 
nine?" Well, I don't know what became of them. Perhaps, they 
went and joined some church ; at any rate, that is the last we hear 
of them. So the people think that if they join some church that 
is all that is required of them. Ha? my friends, "where art the 
nine ? " If the Lord has cleansed you, why don't you lift up your 
'voice in His praise, and give thanks ? Why do you bury your 
talents ? Why don't you confess Christ ? 

It is sweet to Christ to have men confess him. One day he 
said, "Whom do you men say that I am?" He wanted them to 
confess him. But one said, "They say thou art Elias," and 
another, " that thou art Jeremiah ;" and another — "Thou art John 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 291 

the Baptist." But he asked, " Whom do you say that I am?" — 
turning to His disciples. And Peter answers, "Thou art the Son 
of the living God." Then our Lord exclaimed, " Blessed art thou 
Simon Barjona." Yes, He blessed him right there because he 
confessed Him to be the Son of God. 

He was hungry to get some one to confess Him. Then let 
every one take his stand on the side of the Lord ; confess Him 
here on earth, and he will confess you when you get to heaven. 
He will look around upon you with pride, because you stood up 
for Him here. If you want the blessing of heaven and the peace 
that passeth all understanding, you must be ready and willing to 
confess Him. Do you know how Peter fell? He fell like ten 
thousand people fall, because they don't confess the Son of God ; 
that is the way Peter fell. He saw the people standing all around 
and he was ashamed to own his Lord and Master. 

NOT ASKED TO CONFESS YOURSELF. 

Am I speaking to any one here to-night who is ashamed to 
own Christ in his business : ashamed to own Him among his 
circle of acquaintances ? Have you been out to some dinner 
party the last week and heard these meetings ridiculed, and heard 
them scoff and jeer at Christ? If you did, and did not confess 
Him and own Him then, how can you expect to be acknowledged 
before the throne at the judgment day? If you are not willing 
to take your stand on the side of the Lord, you need not expect 
that he will bless you. I can imagine soiue one saying, "I don't 
believe in talking much about myself, and I don't." Well, I don't 
want you to confess yourselves; I want you to confess Christ. 
We have had enough of that first kind of work. Confess Him ; 
that's what I want you to do. 

Look into that 5th chapter of Mark ; it is that man I spoke 
of the other night, how Christ cast out the legions of devils out 
of him, and how he prayed Him he might be with Him. "No," 
He said, " you go home and tell your friends how the Lord had 
compassion on you." The young converts say: "Well, I will go 
to the synagogue every Sunday, but I won't say anything about it." 



292 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

But this man began to publish it, and it says that all men 
did marvel. They wouldn't have it that the Son of God did it. 
The man had never been to college. I don't know as he could 
write his name; I don't know as he had ever been to school. 
There was one thing he did know: he knew the Son of God had 
healed him and had put a new song into his mouth. Christ says, 
" Go home and tell your friends what great things the Lord has 
done." Thus he had the highest eloquence; he had the eloquence 
of heaven. The spirit of the Lord God was upon him. Yes, but 
some of these women say "If I was only a man, I would confess." 

WOMAN THAT STIRRED A WHOLE TOWN. 

Look into the 4th chapter of John. There was a woman that 
stirred up the whole town ; she took one draught of the living 
water and when she went to publish it, she says, "Come and see 
the man that told me everything I ever did; is not this Christ?" 
And then it says that many believed her testimony, and then they 
got Christ into town and He stayed there two or three days and 
many more believed on account of His own works. I wish we had 
a few more women like the woman of Samaria, willing to confess 
what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for our souls. 

Now, there is one man in the 9th chapter of John I want to 
call your attention to. I do not know his name ; I wish I did, 
because he is one of the men I want to see when I get to heaven. 
I would like to read the whole chapter, but it is so long. I will 
just read a few verses — in the ninth verse or eighth verse. It is 
that blind man that Christ gave sight to. Here is a whole chapter 
in John of forty-one verses, just to tell how the Lord blessed that 
blind beggar. It was put in this book, I think, just to bring out 
the confession of that man. "The neighbors, therefore, and they 
which before had seen him which was blind, said, Is not this he 
that sat and begged. Some said this is he; others said, he is like 
him; but he said I am he." 

If it had been our case I think we would have kept still ; we 
would have said, " there is a storm brewing among the Pharisees, 
and they have said " If any man acknowledges Christ we will put 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 203 

him out of the Synagogue." "Now I don't want to be put out 
of the Synagogue." I am afraid we would have said that; that 
is the way with a good many of the young converts. What 
did the young convert here? He said; "I am he." And bear in 
mind he only told what he knew; he knew the Man had given 
his eyes. a Some said he is like him; but he said, I am he." So, 
young converts, open your lips and tell what Christ has done for 
you. If you can't do more than that, open your lips and do that. 
" Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened ? He 
answered and said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and 
anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, Go to the pool of Siloam, 
and wash ; and I went and washed, and I received sight." He said, 
" I anointed my eyes with clay, and I went to the pool and washed, 
and whereas I had no eyes, I have now got two good eyes." 

TELLS HIS EXPERIENCE MANY TIMES. 

Some skeptic might ask, " What is the philosophy of it ?" 
But he couldn't tell that, " Then said they unto him, Where is 
he ? He said, I know not. They brought to the Pharisees him 
that aforetime was blind. And it was the Sabbath day when Jesus 
made the clay and opened his eyes. Then again the Pharisees also 
asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them, I 
put clay upon mine eyes and I washed and do see." He wasn't 
afraid to tell his experience twice, he had just told it once. "There- 
fore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because 
he keepeth not the Sabbath day. Others said, How can a man 
that is a sinner do such miracles ? And there was a division among 
them." 

Now, I am afraid if it had been us, we would have kept still 
and said, " there is a storm brewing." " They say unto the blind 
man again, What sayest thou of Him, that He hath opened thine 
eyes ? He said, He is a prophet." 

Now you see he has got to talking of the Master, and that is 
a grand, good thing. I pity a man or woman that has got an idea 
that the world can't get along without him. This man, he began 
to talk of his Master. ' ' He is a prophet ; that is what I think 



294 CONFESSING CHRIST. 

about him." He knew what he was coming to because the Phari- 
sees had just said if any man confessed Him he was going to be 
cast out of the Synagogue. It wasn't like our churches nowadays, 
for if one church cast a man out, another will take him in if he 
shows any signs of repentance ; but if he was cast out of the 
Synagogue, there were none others to take him in. " And the 
Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and 
received his sight until they called the parents of him that had 
received his sight, and they asked them, saying, Is this your son 
who ye say was born blind ? How, then, doth he now see ? His 
parents answered and said, We know that this is our son, and that 
he was born blind. But by what means he now seeth we know 
not, or who hath opened his eyes we know not ; he is of age, ask 
him ; he will speak for himself." 

HE KNEW HE COULD SEE. 

I do not like those parents; they did know ; they just dodged 
the question ; they were ashamed to confess. What a blessing 
they would have got if they had only confessed. " He is of age, 
ask him." They had rather sit in the synagogue than have Christ. 
" Then again called they the man that was blind, and said unto 
him, give God the praise ; we know that this man is a sinner. 
He answered and said, Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not. 
One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see." They 
couldn't beat that out of him. This young convert got assurance 
right away. " I know that whereas I was blind, now I see." 

I had a good deal rather know that one thing than have all 
the wisdom of the world and not have that. " Then said they 
unto him again, What did He do unto thee ? How opened He 
thine eyes ? He answered them, I have told you already, and ye 
did not hear ; wherefore would ye hear it again, will ye also be his 
disciples ?" He didn't even know Christ ; but he is ready to 
preach for Him. Poor beggar ! Unlearned man ! If you are 
willing to be His disciple, I will tell it to you again ; will you do 
it ? I like the faith that young convert had. 

You do not know what you can do by kindness and forbear- 



CONFESSING CHRIST. 205 

ance. I remember a family in Chicago who used to hoot at me and 
my scholars as we passed their house sometimes. One day one of 
the boys came into the Sunday school and made light of it. As 
he went away, I told him I was glad to see him there and hoped he 
would come again. He came and still made a noise ; but I urged 
him to come the next time, and finally, one day, he said : " I wish 
you would pray for me, boys." That boy came to Crist. He went 
home and confessed his faith, and it wasn't long before that whole 
family had found the way into the Kingdom of God. O, let us 
confess Him to-night and not be ashamed of our religion. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

Compassion of Christ. 

fWANT to call your attention this evening to just one word- 
Compassion. Some time ago I took up the Concordance, and 

ran through the life of Christ to see what it was that moved 
Him to compassion, for we read often in His life, while He was 
down here, that He was moved with compassion. I was deeply 
pleased in my own soul, as I ran through His life and found those 
passages of Scripture that tell us what moved Him with compassion. 
In the 14th chapter of Matthew and 14th verse we find these words: 
" And Jesus went forth and saw a great multitude, and was moved 
with compassion toward them, and He healed their sick." 

He saw the great multitude and He was moved with com- 
passion, and He healed their sick. And in another place it says 
that He healed all that had need of it. There didn't any one need 
to tell Him what was in the hearts of the people. When I stand 
before an audience like this, I cannot read your history, but He 
knew the history of each one. It says in one place in Scripture, 
"each heart knows its own bitterness," and when Christ stood 
before a multitude like this, He knew the particular bitterness 
in each heart ; He could read every man's biography ; He knew the 
whole story ; and, as he stood before that vast multitude the heart 
of the Son of God was moved with compassion, just as in the pre- 
ceding verses we find Him, when John's disciples had come to Him 
with their sad story, and with broken hearts. 

Their beloved master had just been beheaded by the wicked 
King ; they had just buried the headless body, and came to Jesus 
to tell all their sorrow to Him. It was the best thing they could do. 
No one could sympathize with them as Jesus could, no one had the 
same compassion with them that Jesus had. In all our troubles the 
best thing we can do is to follow in the footsteps of John's disciples, 
and tell it all to Him. He is a high-priest that can be touched with 
296 



COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 297 

our infirmities. We find after this in a little while that He, too, 
had to follow in the footsteps of the disciples. He had to lay down 
His life for that nation, but He forgot all about that as He looked 
upon the multitude, and His heart was moved with compassion. 
He sought to do them good ; He sought to heal their sick. 

In Mark (ist chapter and 41st verse) there is a story that 
brings out the compassion of Christ. There came to him a leper, 
and when He saw him, His heart was moved with compassion. 
The poor leper was full of leprosy from head to foot ; he was 
rotten with leprosy. I can just imagine how the leper told his 
whole story to Christ, and it was the very best thing he could do. 
He had no friends to be interested for him ; he might have had 
a wife and family, or a loved mother, but they could not be there to 
plead for him. The law forbid any one speaking to him or touch- 
ing him, but undoubtedly some one had some day come out and 
lifted up his voice and told him that a great prophet had arisen in 
Israel, who could cure him of the leprosy — that he was quite sure 
that He could do it, because He had performed miracles equal to 
that, and that He could give him life if he would only ask Him. 

A SAD SEPARATION. 

This leper told his sad story — let us bring that scene down to 
our own day. Suppose that any one in this assembly here to-night 
should find that he was a leper and the law required him to leave 
home. What a scene it must have been when that poor leper left 
his home, left the wife of his bosom, left his own offspring, with the 
thought that he never was to see them again ! It was worse than 
death ; he had to go into a living sepulchre, to vanish from home, 
wife, from mother, father, children, friends, and live outside of the 
walls of the city. And while he was out there, if any man should 
come near him he had to cry, " Unclean ! unclean ! unclean ! " He 
had to wear a certain kind of garment, so that all men should 
know him. You can see him outside of the walls of the city ! It 
might happen in the course of years that some one came out and 
shouted at the top of his voice, and told him that his little child 
was dying, but he could not go to see his dying child or wife. 



298 COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 

There in exile he had to remain, banished from home while 
his body was rotting with that terrible disease, with no loved friends 
to care for him, nothing to do to occnpy his time. That was the 
condition of the poor leper, and when he heard that Jesus conld 
cure him, he went to Him and said, " Lord, if thou wilt Thou 
canst cure me ; Lord hear my pitiful story, Lord have mercy upon 
me; Lord save me." And Jesus was moved with compassion, and 
He reached out His hand and touched him. The law forbade Him 
doing it — forbade any one touching him — but that great heart was 
moved, and He touched the man, and the moment He touched him 
the leprosy was gone; he was healed that very moment. He went 
home and told his wife and family what a great blessing had come 
to him. 

SOMETHING WORSE THAN EASTERN LEPROSY. 

Did you ever stop to think that the leprosy of sin is a thousand 
times worse than that Eastern leprosy ? All that it could do was to 
destroy the body. It might eat out the eye, it might eat off the hand, 
it might eat off the foot — but think of the leprosy of sin ! It 
brought angels from heaven, from the highest heights of glory 
down, not only into this world, but into the very pit of hell. Satan 
once lifted upon high hallelujahs of heaven, but sin brought him 
out of heaven down into darkness. Look into the home of the 
drunkard ; look into the home of the libertine ; look into the home 
of the harlot ; look into the homes of those who are living in sin. 

The leprosy of sin is a thousand times worse than the Eastern 
leprosy of the body, but if the poor sinner, all polluted with sin, 
will come to Christ, and say as this leper did that we have just read 
about, "Lord, Thou canst have compassion upon me ; Thou canst take 
away this desire for sin ; if Thou wilt, Thou canst save me," He 
will save you to-night. Oh, sinner, you had better come to Him ; 
He is the very best friend that you have. It is Jesus that we preach 
here to-night, the son of God. He has come to help you; He 
stands in this assembly now. We cannot see him with the bodily 
eye, but we can with the eye of faith, and He will save every sinner 
who will come to Him to-night. 



COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 299 

My dear friends, will you not come to Him and ask Him to 
have mere}- and compassion upon you ? If I were an artist, I would 
like to paint that scene and bring out vividly that poor filthy leper 
coming to the Son of God, and the Son of God reaching out His 
hand and touching and cleansing him. 

A FATHER AND HIS BELOVED CHILD. 

And if I were an artist, I would like to draw another picture 
and hang it up on yonder wall, that you might see it : that is of 
the father that came to Christ with his beloved boy. He had been 
up on the mountain with Peter, James and John, and there He met 
Elijah the Prophet and Moses the law-giver. Heaven and earth 
had come together, and there He had met His Father and He had 
spoken to Him that memorable night on the mountain. In the 
morning, when he came down, a crowd of people gathered round 
him, and some were laughing and talking ; they had been trying 
to cast the evil spirit out of this boy, and told his pitiful story. No 
one knows but a father how much that man loved that boy, his 
heart was wrapped up in that child ; but the boy was not only deaf 
and dumb, but he was possessed with a devil, and sometimes this 
devil would throw him into the fire and sometimes into the water ; 
and when the father came to Jesus, He said to him : 

" Bring him unto Me." And when he was coming, the devil 
cast him down to the ground. So every man on his way to Christ 
must first be cast down. There he lay foaming, wallowing, and 
Jesus only said, " How long has this been?" "From his birth," 
was the answer. " Oh, you do not know how much I have suffered 
with this boy ! When a child he was grievously tormented ; he has 
broken my heart." Some of you here perhaps have children who are 
suffering from some terrible disease, and who are breaking your 
hearts — you can sympathize with that father. How that father 
wept when he brought that poor boy ! And when Jesus saw that 
pitiful scene His heart was moved with compassion, and with a 
word He cast out the devil. Let us learn a lesson. Mother, 
father, have you got a son that the devil has taken possession of ? 
Bring him to Jesus. He delights to bless. 



300 COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 

All we have to do is to take him in the arms of our faith and 
bring him to Jesus, I want to call your attention to a difference 
between the father we read of in the 9th chapter of Mark and the 
poor leper in the 1st chapter. The leper says : " If Thou wilt, Thou 
canst make me whole." There was the " if " in the right place. 
The other said : " If Thou canst have compassion. " He puts the 
if in the wrong place. The Lord said, " If thou canst believe, all 
things are possible." Let us believe that the Son of God can save 
our Sons and our daughters. Oh, have you got a poor drunken 
son ? Have you a poor brother who is a slave to strong drink ? 
Come ; bring him to the meeting here to-morrow night and let your 
cry be, " Lord, have compassion on my darling boy and save him." 

A DEAD MAN RIGHT IN THE PATH. 

About Jesus there was a great number of disciples as He was 
going near the little city of Nain, and what met His eyes ? Why, 
there was a dead man carried out, and I cannot help but think of 
that passage. When I was preaching to the men last Sunday 
night, a poor man fell dead, and while we were preaching he was 
carried out. And here there was a dead man being carried out of 
the city of Nain, and there was a great number of his friends 
accompanying that widow to lay away her only child, her only son. 
He was her only son, it says, and his mother was a widow. The 
father, the head of the house, had died perhaps long before, and 
long before that mother had watched over that husband, and at 
last she closed his eyes in death. It was a terrible blow, and now 
death had come again. 

You who are mothers can see how through all that sickness 
that mother was not willing to let the neighbors come in and 
watch over that baby. For weeks you can see a light burning in 
that little cottage in Nain. There is that mother, she is watching 
over that boy, her only son. How she loved him. You that are 
mothers can sympathize with her. You that are mothers can enter 
into full sympathy with her. You can see how hard it was to 
lose that only son. She will never look into that beautiful face 
again. She will never look into those beautiful eyes again. They 



COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 301 

have been closed ; she has closed them with her own loving hands. 
She has imprinted the last kiss upon that lovely cheek. 

Now, they lay him upon the coffin, or upon the bier, and per- 
haps four men take him up jnst as they did the man with the 
palsy, and they bear him away to his resting-place and there is a 
great multitude coming out of Nain. All Nain is moved. The 
widow was loved very much and there was a great multitude at- 
tending her. And now we see them as they are coming out of the 
gate of the city. The disciples look, and they see a great crowd 
coming out of Nain, and the two crowds, the two great multitudes 
come together, and the Son of God looks upon that scene. 

A CAPTIVE IN THE HANDS OF DEATH. 

We read often where He looked toward heaven and sighed. 
He had followers on His right hand, followers on His left hand, 
followers behind him, and followers before him. He saw the woe 
and suffering in this wretched world, but he looked upon that 
weeping mother. Death had got its captive. And shall not the 
son of God look upon that widow. He saw those tears trickling 
down her cheeks, and the great heart of the Son of God was moved. 
He would not suffer that son to pass. He commanded the young 
men to rest the bier. "Young man, I say unto thee, arise!" and 
the dead heard the voice of the Son of God and he arose. I can 
imagine him saying, " Blessed be God, I am alive." 

You know Christ never preached any funeral sermons. Here 
death had met its conquerer, and when he spoke the word away 
went death. The Son of God was moved with compassion for that 
poor widow, and there isn't a poor widow in all this city, but that 
Christ sympathizes with her. You that are widows mourning over 
loved ones, let me say to you Jesus is full of compassion. Let me 
say He is the same to-night that he was eighteen hundred years 
ago when he bound up that poor widow's heart in Nain. He will 
comfort you, and to-night, if you will just come to Him, ask Him 
to bind up your wounded heart, ask Him to help you to bear this 
great affliction, the Son of God will do it. You will find that His 
arm is underneath you to help you carry the burden. 



302 COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 

There isn't a poor, suffering, crushed, bruised heart in all this 
city but that the Son of God is in sympathy with, and He will 
have compassion on you if you only come home to Him, and He 
will bind up that heart of yours. Yes, Jesus was moved with com- 
passion when He saw that poor widow. They did not need to tell 
Him the story ; He saw how the heart of the mother was broken 
and so He just spoke the word. He didn't take him with Him. 
He might have taken him along with Him to glorify Himself, but 
He gave him to the mother. He took him right out of the arms of 
death and handed him back to the mother. Yes, there was a happy 
home in Nain that night. How surprised the mother must have 
been ; she could hardly believe her eyes. Oh, my friends, Jesus 
has got the same power to-night, and He will bind up your aching 
hearts if you will only just come to Him. 

HE IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 

Did you ever hear of one coming to Christ that He did not 
accept ? He don't care what position in life you hold. No matter 
how low down you are ; no matter what your disposition has been ; 
you may be low in your thoughts, words, and actions ; you may be 
selfish ; your heart may be overflowing with corruption and wicked- 
ness ; yet Jesus will have compassion upon you. He will speak 
comforting words to you , not treat you coldly or spurn you, as 
perhaps those of earth would, but will speak tender words, and 
words of love and affection and kindness. 

Just come at once. He is a faithful friend — a friend that 
sticketh closer than a brother. He is a brother born for adversity. 
Treat him like a brother and like a friend and you will have a 
heavenly balm placed upon your wretched, broken heart. He is 
tangible. We don't worship a myth ; we don't praise an unreal 
being. He is an everlasting, living person, a Man sitting at the 
right hand of God, full of the power and the majesty of heaven. 
He comes here to-night in the spirit. He is present with you. Oh, 
accept Him, and he will deliver you and save you, and bless you. 
My friends, just treat Him as if }'ou saw Him here in person ; as 
if He stood here in person the same as I do now. 



COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 303 

Come to Him, then, with all your troubles, and He will bless 
you. If He were here, and you saw him beckoning unto you, you 
would come, wouldn't you ? Well, you would be saved then by 
sight ; but He wants us to take Him by faith. There are those 
here to-night that believe He is here now. Yes, you have come 
here for Christ, and are ready to confess His name. You are 
witnesses to His name. Yes, here are two or three gathered 
together in the name of Christ, and he is here, because He has 
promised. Take Him at His word, then, my friends. The Son of 
God is here to-night. Do you doubt it ? Is there a man or woman 
in this assembly to-night that doubts it ? I tell you He is here. 
He is just here as much as if you saw Him. Press up to Him. 
He is infinite in compassion, and will take pity upon you. 

A TENDER HAND FOR ALL IN TROUBLE. 

Oh, my friends, that was earthly compassion, but what con- 
ception can you form of the compassion of Jesus ; if you come and 
tell Him your sad stories His heart will be moved. Oh, come and 
tell Him your sins and misery. He knows what human nature is ; 
He knows what poor, weak, frail mortals we are, and how prone we 
are to sin. He will have compassion upon you ; He will reach out 
His tender hand and touch you as He did the poor leper. You will 
know the touch of His loving hand — there is virtue and sympathy 
in it. 

That story of the soldier reminds me of another. A mother 
received a dispatch that her boy had been wounded. She resolved 
to go down to the front to see him. She knew that the nursing of 
the hospital would not be as tender as hers would be. After much 
solicitation she saw the doctor, and after repeated warnings from 
him not to touch the boy or wake him up — he had only a few days 
to live at any rate, and waking him up would only hasten his 
death — she went to his bedside. When she saw the poor boy lying 
there so still and lifeless and with the marks of his suffering so 
fresh upon him, she could not resist the temptation to lay her hand 
on his brow. Instinct told him it was his mother's loving hand, 
and without opening his eyes he said, " Oh, mother, have you 



304 COMPASSION OF CHRIST. 

come ? " Let Jesus touch you to-uight. His is a loving, tender 
hand, full of sympathy and compassion. Oh, my brother [looking 
at a young man in one of the front pews], will you have Him 
to-night ? You will ? Thank God, thank God, he says he will 
accept Him. We have been praying two or three days for this 
young man and now he says he will take Christ. Oh, bless the 
Lord. Let us pray, and as we pray, let us make room for Jesus in 
our hearts as this man has done, upon whom He has had com- 
passion, and whom He has saved. 



CHAPTER XX. 

What Seek Ye ? 

HERE are two things I want to call yonr attention to this 
i^) afternoon. The first is in the words of the ist chapter of 
John, 38th verse, and the second is in the 6th chapter cf 
Matthew, 33d verse. The first text is the first words that fell 
from the lips of Christ at the commencement of His ministry. It 
wos the question He put to those two disciples that came and ques- 
tioned Him as to where He dwelt. 

One afternoon, about four o'clock, John the Baptist stood with 
two of his disciples, and Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, a little 
way off, and John lifted up his hand and pointed to the man off in 
the distance, and said: "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh 
away the sins of the world !" and John the beloved disciple, and 
Andrew, left their old master and went together toward Jesus, and 
Jesus turned around as they came up to Him and said : " What 
seek ye ?" I thought this afternoon I would like for a few moments 
to call your attention to that text and press that question home 
upon the people here. I would like to have all of you ask your- 
selves the questions. What are you seeking ? What did you come 
for — what motive brought you here this afternoon ? What do these 
great crowds of people here mean, day after day, week after week ? 

There were all classes of people seeking for Christ, and they 
had every kind of motive for seeking Him. There were some who 
came out of curiosity, just to see what would happen. There was 
another class who came to Him just because they had friends that 
were diseased, and they wanted their friends to be healed and blessed. 
There was the class who came with the hope of getting the loaves 
and fishes. And there was still another class that were trying to 
murder Him and to get Him out of the way ; they were watching 
Him and striving to get Him into some conversation in which they 
might entangle Him with His words, and so get an excuse to bring 
20 305 



306 WHAT SEEK YE? 

him before the Sanhedrim, and canse Him to be called guilty of 
blasphemy, and punished. 

Some sought Him for what they could get, and others sought 
Him for what He was ; and that is the class we are after, namely, 
those who are not seeking Christ for what they can get, but who 
are seeking Him for what He is personally. I have no doubt but 
that a great many of the disciples at first sought Him in order to 
be identified with Him, because they thought he would set up an 
earthly kingdom, and establish his throne upon earth. Jndas, per- 
haps, thought so, and that he might become the chief treasurer of 
such a kingdom ; and, perhaps, Peter thought that he might become 
the chief secretary ; and when the sons of Zebedee found out that 
it was a spiritual kingdom that He was to establish, their mother 
came and asked of Christ that her sons might be placed the one 
upon His right hand and the other upon His left. 

SELF-SEEKERS ARE STUMBLING-BLOCKS. 

All the time during His ministry Christ constantly found men 
seeking for office and honor ; and that is precisely the spirit to-day. 
One of our greatest troubles, and one great reason why we do not 
get greater blessings from God, is because we are not pure in our 
motives for seeking Him. I say there is not a man or a woman 
(and I see they are nearly all women here to-day) who has come 
here for a blessing from God, and who had that motive, but will get 
it. Others will go away without any blessing and with hearts as 
hard and cold as ever. Why ? Because they have not come to get 
a blessing. 

I would like to ask you to take this brief question home to 
your hearts to-day, "What seek ye?" What are you after this 
afternoon ? What motive brought you to this place ? I think one 
w T ould say, "I came because some friends of mine were coming ; 
I did not have any particular motive at all ; I came because my 
friends asked me to come.'' I ask another, What did you come 
for? "Well, I came to see the crowd ; I heard there were a great 
many men and women here, and I thought it would be a wonder- 
ful sight to see so many together." 



WHAT SEEK YE? 307 

A man told me the other day that he came to see the chairs. 
He said he heard that there were ten thousand chairs all in one 
hall, and he thought they must look so strange. He had a curi- 
osity to see them. Thank God that man got caught in the Gospel 
net that very night, and I hope some others that come just out of 
curiosity this afternoon will get caught with the old Gospel net. But 
to return to our question, What brought you here ? A lady over 
there says, " I came to hear the singing, I don't care anything about 
the preaching. I have heard the word preached till I am tired of 
it, and if I had my way about it I would rather get up and go out 
as soon as the singing is over." 

THE RIGHT MOTIVE CROWNED WITH SUCCESS. 

But if any of you have come here with such motives, and will 
change your minds after you get here, and will seek to come to 
God to-day, you will find him, whatever your motive was at 
first in coming. You may even have come here to make sport 
of the meeting ; you may have come here to ridicule everything 
you should hear, but if you will repent and change your mind the 
Lord Jesus will bless you to-day, and forgive you, and this may be 
the best meeting you ever was at in your life if you will. 

Now I want to call your attention to the other text I spoke of. 
My text is both a question and a command. The question is, 
" What seek ye ? " and the command is this, " Seek ye first the King- 
dom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be 
added unto you." This is just as much a command as that is, that 
you shall not steal. It is just as much a command for us to seek 
the Kingdom of God and His righteousness as it is a command that 
we shall not swear. It is one of the commands of the Bible. 

Jesus, when he was down here, in that memorable sermon on 
the Mount, said : "Seek first the Kingdom of God." That was to 
come first ; it was to come ahead of everything else. The Master's 
ways are not our ways. God's thoughts are not our thoughts. 
What we put last God puts first ; what we put first He puts last ; 
the whole thing is reversed. We say we do not want to seek the 
Kingdom of God first. We have a good many things that must be 






308 WHAT SEEK YE? 

attended to before we seek the Kingdom of God. I know if per- 
sons think they would like to be converted they always think they 
have some preparations to make beforehand. 

Now, this is just as much a command to-day as it was so many 
hundreds of years ago. Do you think if He was on earth to-day 
He would alter that command ? Do you think he would say for 
you to put off your salvation for one hour ? Do you think He 
would tell you to seek His Kingdom at some future time ? Every 
day we hear of persons dying suddenly, sometimes without God 
and without hope, because they have not obeyed this command to 
seek first the Kingdom of God. One reason that people do not 
seek first the Kingdom of God is this : that they do not believe 
that God is real, and that He has a Kingdom, and that they can 
find Him ; but they make light of the existence of His Kingdom. 

WHY NOT SEEK THE BEST THINGS? 

The whole living world is seeking for something. There is 
not a person in this world who is not seeking for something. Then 
why not seek for the best things ? If people will so seek for tem- 
poral things, doesn't it serve to show that you do not believe that 
Gcd is real, or else you would seek first the Kingdom of God, and 
find it before any of these other things ? 

I heard some time ago of a young man who wanted to become 
a Christian. His father was a worldly man, full of ambition and a 
desire to get on. His son went to him and told him his wish. The 
father turned around in astonishment, put on a dissatisfied look, and 
said : " My son, you have made a mistake. You had better wait 
until you get established in business ; wait till you get older ; 
better wait till you make some money ; there is plenty of time yet 
to become a Christian." Does any young man here believe that ? 
You know what the rich man in the Scripture said and did. That 
man had got well on in business ; he had made lots of money ; his 
goods were increasing every year. 

At last, after an unusually plentiful harvest, he found he had 
to build more barns and storehouses. He felt sure of being able to 
enjoy himself; he was happy and contented as he thought how his 



WHAT SEEK YEi» 309 

bank account was swelling. " Soul, take thine ease ; thou hast 
much goods laid up for many days." He never thought of the 
future ; the present was all he cared anything about. But in his 
fancied security he heard the dread and startling summons, " Thou 
fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee." He had to 
leave all these things behind him ; death snatched him away, and 
he lost the heaven he had neglected to make sure of on earth. 

I heard a story of a young lady who was deeply concerned 
about her soul. Her father and mother, however, were worldly 
people. They thought lightly of her serious wishes ; they did not 
sympathize with her state of mind. They made up their minds that 
she should not become a Christian, and tried every way they could 
to discourage her notions about religion. At last they thought 
they would get up a large party, and thus with gayety and pleasure 
win her back to the world. 

THE BELLE OF THE BALL. 

So they made every preparation for a gay time ; they even sent 
to neighboring ( owns and got all her most worldly companions to 
come to the house ; they bought her a magnificent silk dress and 
jewelry, and decked her out in all the finery of such an occasion. 
The young lady thought there would be no harm in attending the 
party ; that it would be a trifling affair, a simple thing, and she 
could, after it was over, think again of the welfare of her soul. She 
went decked out in all her adornments, and was the belle of the 
ball. Three weeks from that night she was on her dying bed. She 
asked her mother to bring her ball dress in. She pointed her finger 
at it, and, bursting into tears, said, " That is the price of my soul." 
She died before the dawn. 

Oh, my friends, if you are anxious about your soul, let every- 
thing else go ; let parties and festivals pass. Seek ye first the 
Kingdom of God ; then all these things will be added unto you. 
God commands you to do it. If you are lost — if you die in your 
sin — whose fault is it ? God has commanded you to repent and 
to seek salvation at once. 

Are any of you going to take the responsibility of putting it 



31 WHAT SEEK YE ? 

off? You complain because Christ is urged upon you ; you com- 
plain because your friends are anxious about you. How can they 
be otherwise than anxious ? You heard what Mr. Sankey said a 
little while ago about the death of a husband of one of our choir. 
This morning, while I was preaching, he passed away. We prayed 
for him at the opening, and again at the close of that service, but 
he was gone before we got through. Three of the ushers have been 
taken away since I have been preaching here. 

A CLEAR TITLE. 

When I got up here to preach this afternoon I said to myself: 
" Perhaps it is my turn next." But, thank God, I have an interest 
up yonder. I can read my title clear there. I have sought and 
found Christ. But on the other hand, see how people go on day by 
day and year by year and disobey the command of God. They say 
there is plenty of time. Why, you hear every day of wills being 
upset because the man's mind was proved not to be clear when 
he made the will on his death-bed. If his mind is not clear 
enough when he is dying to settle his little affairs here below, is 
that a time to repent and make provision for eternity ? Is it the 
time, when we are racked with pain and tortured with anguish, to 
turn our hearts to God ? Is that a time to begin to think of salva- 
tion ? Is it right or honorable to give the dregs of a wasted and 
misspent life to God? 

I tell you I have not much faith in death-bed repentances. I 
do not limit the power and mercy of God, but I do not believe in 
them. If there is one out of a thousand that are saved, there are 
nine hundred and ninety-nine that are lost. They think that they 
repent then, but they are scared and terrified ; it is not repentance, 
it is fear ; when they get better, they go right back again to their 
wicked ways. We cannot scare people into repentance ; they must'' 
be born in, not be scared in. 

Let us reason for a moment. Suppose you ask the advice of a 
friend on the earth as to whether you had not better repent now. 
While I am preaching, young lady, just ask your mother sitting 
beside you what you had better do. Whisper to her — I'll excuse 



WHAT SEEK YE? 311 

you — ask her if you had not better seek the Kingdom of God now. 
Young lady, there is not one in the wide, wide world who loves you 
as your mother. Would she not advise you to accept Christ? Now 
just ask her. 

Most of those who are not Christians will advise you to seek 
the Kingdom of God now, this very minute. If I go up yonder 
and ask them in heaven, every one there would tell you to seek the 
kingdom now. Paul for three years preached upon immediate re- 
pentance. He besought his hearers with tears to turn from their 
sins and be saved. " Behold, now is the accepted time." That was 
what he preached. Yes, I leave heaven and earth, and go down to 
the very borders of hell, and will ask them there if it is not better 
to repent now. They would all with one voice answer, " Yes, yes, 
yes.'' The only time we ever heard from that place was to have a 
young man implore that word might be sent to his father's house 
that his brothers there might be warned against neglecting salva- 
tion. 

Yes, the lost ones would tell you to escape and seek the King- 
dom of God and be saved. Why, then, heaven, earth and hell all 
unite in warning you to seek the Kingdom of God. Why will you 
not do it, then ? Why not accept Christ this very day ? Just think 
what will become of you if you do not. 

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN THE MILL FELL. 

When the Lawrence Mills were on fire a number of years ago 
— I don't mean on fire, but when the mill fell in — the great mill fell 
in, and after it had fallen in, the ruins caught fire. There was only 
one room left entire, and in it were three Mission Sunday-school 
children imprisoned. The neighbors and all hands got their 
shovels and picks and crowbars, and were working to set the chil- 
dren free. It came on night and they had not yet reached the 
children. 

When they were near them, by some mischance a lantern 
broke, and the ruins caught fire. They tried to put it out, but 
they could not succeed. They could talk with the children, and 
even pass to them some hot coffee and some refreshments, and 



312 WHAT SEEK YE? 

encouraged them to keep up. But, alas, the flames drew nearer 
and nearer to this prison. Superhuman were the efforts made to 
rescue the children ; the men bravely fought back the flames, but 
the fire gained fresh strength and returned to claim its victims. 

Then piercing shrieks arose when the spectators saw that the 
efforts of the firemen were hopeless. The children saw their fate. 
They then knelt down and commenced to sing the little hymn we 
have all been taught in our Sunday-school days : " Let others seek 
a home below which flames devour and waves o'erflow." The 
flames had now reached them; the stifling smoke began to pour into 
their little room, and they began to sink, one by one, upon the 
floor. A few moments more and the fire circled around them and 
their souls were taken into the bosom of Christ. Yes, let others 
seek a home below if they will, but seek ye the Kingdom of God 
with all your hearts. 

COULD NOT ESCAPE THAT TEXT. 

When I was a young man, before I left my native town, I 
was at work in the field one day in company with a man, a neigh- 
bor of mine. All at once I saw him begin to weep. I asked him 
what the trouble was. He then told me a strange story — strange 
to me then, for I was not at that time a Christian. He said that 
his mother was a Christian when he left home to seek his fortune. 
When he was about starting his mother took him by the hand 
and spoke these parting words: "My son, seek ye first the King- 
dom of God and His righteousness, and all things else shall be 
added unto thee." 

"This," said he, "was my mother's favorite text." When he 
got into the town to which he was going, he had to spend the 
Sabbath there. He went to church, and the minister took this 
very text — "Seek ye first the kingdom of God." He thought it 
very strange. Well, he said he would not seek the kingdom then, 
he would wait until he got a start in life — until he got a farm and 
some money. Yet that text troubled him. Again he went to 
church, and to his amazement the sermon was on that very same 
text. He did not attend church for some time. 



WHAT SEEK YE? 313 

At last he was induced again to enter the church, and behold! 
he heard the preacher take that very same text. He thought then 
it was God speaking to him; that his mother's prayers were being 
answered. But he coolly, calmly, and deliberately made up his 
mind that he would not be a Christian. "I have never heard any 
sermon that has made any impression on me since." I was not a 
Christian myself, so I didn't know how to talk to him. The time 
came for me to leave home. I went to Boston, and there I became 
a convert. When I got to be a Christian the first thing that came 
into my mind was that man. I made up my mind to try to 
bring him to Christ. 

When I came home I mentioned the name to my mother and 
asked if he was living. "Is he living?" she exclaimed; "didn't 
I write to you about him ?" "Write me what?" "Why that he 
had gone out of his mind and is now in the insane asylum." 
When I got up there he pointed his finger at me; says he, 
"Young man, 'seek ye first the Kingdom of God.'" He had 
never forgotten the text. Although his mind was shattered and 
gone, the text was there. 

My friends, do let that man speak to you. He is gone now. 
How much better it would have been for him to have followed his 
mother's prayer. The spirit of God may be striving with some 
one to-day. I may be standing here for the last time. Let me 
plead with you once more to seek the Kingdom of God, and seek 
it with all your hearts. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

"To Every Man His Work." 

fWANT to call your attention to a verse you will find in the 
13th chapter of Mark, part of the 34th verse — " To every man 

his work." " For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far 
journey, who left his. house and gave authority to his servants, and 
to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch." Now, 
by reading that verse carefully it don't read, " to every man some 
work," or "to every man a work," but " to every man his work." 
And I believe, if the truth was known, that every man and woman 
in this assembly has a work laid out for them to do ; that every 
man's life is a plan of the Almighty, and way back in the councils 
of eternity God laid out a work for each one of us. 

There is no man living that can do the work that God has got 
for me to do. No one can do it but myself. And if the work ain't 
done we will have to answer for it when we stand before God's bar. 
For it says: "Every man shall be brought unto judgment, and 
every one shall give an account of the deeds done in the body." 
And it seems to me that every one of us ought to take this ques- 
tion home to-night: "Well, am I doing the work that God has for 
me to do?" God has got a work for every one of us to do. 

Now, in the parable the man who had two talents had the same 
reward as the man who had five talents. He heard the same words 
as the man who had five talents: "Well done, thou good and 
faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." The men 
that take good care of the talents that God has loaned them, he 
always gives them more. But if we take the talent that God has 
given us and lay it away carefully in a napkin and bury it away, 
God will take even that from us. God don't want a man that has 
got one talent to do the work of a man that has got ten. All a 
man has got to answer for is the one that God has given each man. 

If we are all of us doing the work that God has got for us to 
314 



"TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 315 

do, don't you see how the work of the Lord would advance? I 
believe in what John Wesley used to say, "All at it, and always 
at it," and that is what the Church wants to day. 

But men say, " I don't believe in these revivals; it's only tem- 
porary, it only lasts a few minutes." Yes, if I thought it was 
only to last a few minutes, I would say "Amen" to everything 
they say. IVty prayer has been for years that God will let me die 
when the spirit of revival dies out in my heart, and I don't want 
to live any longer if I can't be used to some purpose. What are 
we all down in this world of sickness and sorrow for unless it is to 
*vork for the Son of God, and improve the talents He has given us. 

DWARFS AMONG CHRISTIANS. 

But some men are not satisfied with the talents they have, but 
are always wishing for some one else's talents. Now, that is all 
wrong. It is contrary to the spirit of Christ. Instead of wishing 
for some one else's talents, let us make the best use of the talents 
God has given us. Now, there ain't a father or a mother here but 
would think it a great misfortune if their children shouldn't grow 
any for the next ten or fifteen years. That little boy there, if he 
shouldn't grow any for ten or fifteen years, his mother would say, 
"It is a great calamity." I know some men of my acquaintance 
who make the same prayers they made fifteen or twenty years ago. 
They are like a horse in a tread-mill — it is always the same old 
story of their experiences when they were converted, and going 
round and round. 

If you had a child that was deaf and dumb, you would think 
it a great misfortune. Do you ever think how many dumb children 
God has got ? You speak about political matters, and they can 
talk. You ask them about stocks and bonds, and hear them talk. 
You talk to them about the hard times in this city, and see if they 
can't talk. But you ask them to speak about the Son of God, and * 
they say : "Oh, no; I can't speak about that. Please excuse me." 
Either they don't believe, or they have gone like the third man and 
buried their talent, and they say, " The Lord is a hard master." 

I remember once a party of gentlemen speaking of this parable 



316 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 

that I read, and asking a deaf man, " What do yon think of this 
man's hiding his talent, and about the justice of his reward ?" The 
deaf man replied, "I don't know anything about the justice of his 
reward, but I know he is a liar. The Lord isn't a hard master. He 
told lies when he said that." And so these men who bmy their 
talents, they think the Lord is a hard master ; but the men who 
are using their talents, they don't think the Lord is a hard 
master. 

Let us do all the business we can. If we can't be a lighthouse, 
let us be a tallow candle. There used to be a period when the 
people came up to meeting bringing their candles with them. The 
first one, perhaps, wouldn't make a great illumination ; but when 
two or three got there, there would be more light. If the people 
of this city should do that now, if each one should come here with 
your candle, don't you think there would be a little light ? Let all 
the gas be put out in this hall, and one solitary candle would give 
a good deal of light here. If we can't be a lighthouse, let us be a 
tallow candle. Some one said, " I can't be anything more than a 
farthing rushlight." Well, if you can't be more, be that; that is 
well enough. Be all you can. 

WHY THE DEAD SEA IS DEAD. 

What makes the Dead Sea dead ? Because it is all the time 
receiving, never giving out anything. Why is it that many Chris- 
tians are cold ? Because they are all the time receiving, never 
giving out anything. You go ever}' Sunda}^ and hear good ser- 
mons, and think that is enough. You are all the time receiving 
these grand truths, but never give them out. When you hear it, 
go and scatter the sacred truth abroad. Instead of having one 
minister to preach to a thousand people, this thousand ought to 
take a sermon and spread it until it reaches those that never go to 
church or chapel. Instead of having a few, we ought to have 
thousands using the precious talents that God has given them. 

Now, Andrew got the reputation of bringing people to Christ. 
He went about it in the right way ; he began right. I imagine 
that when Christ wanted these mighty deeds done He went out and 



"TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 317 

hunted up Andrew. Andrew inquired of the people, " Have you 
seen anything of Peter?" and when he found him, he brought 
him to Christ. 

Little did Andrew know of the importance of the day when 
he brought Peter to Christ. Little did he think that on that day 
he did the greatest act of his life. What joy must have filled his 
heart when he saw three thousand brought under the influence of 
the Spirit by that holy man. Oh, you cannot tell what results will 
follow if you just improve the talent God has given you by bring- 
ing one Simon Peter to Christ. Then we read that when the 
Greeks came and wanted to see Jesus, Andrew met them and 
brought them all to Christ. Andrew had a reputation of bringing 
sinners to God. That is a good reputation. I would rather have 
that reputation than any other. O, the joy there is in bringing 
people to Christ. This is what we all can do if we will. 

MAKE USE OF WHAT YOU HAVE. 

If God has given us but half a talent, let us make good use 
of that. When God told the people to take their seats by fifties, 
He told Philip to get food for them. " What," says Philip, " feed 
them with this little loaf? Why, there is not more than enough 
for the first man." " Yes, go and feed them with that." Philip 
thought that was a very small amount for such a multitude of 
hungry men. He broke off a piece for the first man, and didn't 
miss it ; a piece for the second man, and didn't miss it ; a piece for 
the third man, and didn't miss it. He was making good use of the 
loaf, and God kept increasing it. That is what the Lord wants to 
do with us. He will give us just as many talents as we can take 
care of. 

There are many of us that are willing to do great things for 
the Lord, but few of us willing to do little things. The mighty 
sermon on regeneration was preached to one man. There are many 
who are willing to preach to thousands, but are not willing to 
take their seat beside one soul and lead that soul to the blessed 
Jesus. We must get down to personal effort — this bringing one 
bv one to the Son of God. 



318 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 

We can find no better example of this than in the life of Christ 
Himself. Look at that wonderful sermon that He preached to that 
lone woman at the well of Samaria. He was tired and weary, but 
He had time and the heart to preach to her. This is but one of 
many instances in the life of the Master from which we may learn 
a precious lesson. If the Son of God had time to preach to one 
soul, cannot every one of us go and do the same ? If people, instead 
of coming to these meetings, folding up their arms and enjoying 
themselves, without personal effort, would wake up to the fact that 
they have a work to do, what a wonderful work could be done ! 

GREAT CALL FOR WORKERS. 

It is not enough to come to these meetings ; we want ten thou- 
sand workers in this city. We want ten thousand men and women 
that are willing to say, " Lord, here am I, use me." Ten thousand 
of such people would revolutionize this city in a little while. Look 
at the work of the mighty Wesley. The world never saw a hun- 
dred such men living at the same time. The trouble is we are 
afraid to speak to men about their souls. 

Let us ask God to give us grace to overcome this man-fearing 
spirit. There is a wife but she dare not speak to her husband 
about his soul. There is a father that dare not speak to a son about 
his soul. What we want to do is to speak to our neighbors about 
these things. We call it a little work, but let me say to you it is 
a great deal. If we would do this we might turn ten thousand to 
the Son of God. 

I remember hearing of a person that was always trying to da 
some great thing for the Lord, and because he could not do a great 
thing he never did anything. There are a great many who would 
be willing to do great things if they could come up and have their 
names heralded through the press. I remember hearing of a man's 
dream, in which he imagined that when he died he was taken by 
the angels to a beautiful temple. After admiring it for a time, he 
discovered that one stone was missing. All finished but just one 
little stone ; that was left out. He said to the angel, " What is this 
stone left out for?" The angel replied, " That was left out for 



"TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 319 

you, but you wanted to do great things, and so there was no room 
left for you." He was startled and awoke, and resolved that lie 
would become a worker for God, and that man always wonted faith- 
fully after that. 

SHE SHIRKED HER DUTY. 

Now, my friends, we must not expect to do great things. We 
must take anything that comes to us. We must let the Lord use 
us as he sees fit. I remember once, while preaching at a meeting, 
of noticing in the congregation a lady who had a class in a mission 
school. I knew that it was the time for them to meet, and I won- 
dered w T hat she was there for. When I got home I said, " How did 
you happen to be at the meeting this afternoon ? What did you do 
with all those little lambs ? Haven't you a class that meets to- 
day?" " Yes." she said, " but I only have five little boys, and I 
didn't think it would matter if I didn't teach them to-day." " Have 
you five little boys ? " " Yes." " How do you know but among 
those little boys there may be a Knox, there may be a Wesley, or 
a Whitfield, or a Bunyan ? There may be a man there who will 
go out and revolutionize the world" 

My friends, in that little boy with bis tattered clothes and 
uncombed hair there may be a Martin Luther, if you would but 
lead him to Christ. If you have five little children come to you, 
thank God for that, and start with your work. I heard some time 
ago of a young lady that went out to a boarding-school. Her 
parents were very wealthy, and sent her to the best school they 
could find. They were very anxious that their daughter should 
shine in the highest circle of society, that she should become 
refined and educated. 

Among her associates at school was a lady who loved and 
worked for Christ. By constant labor she won this young girl's 
heart, and pleaded with her to become a Christian. She suc- 
ceeded, and the young lady became a worker in the vineyard of 
the Lord. She taught her the luxury of working for Christ. She 
labored with her schoolmates, and God used her in winning quite 
a number of young ladies in that school to Christ. 



320 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 

I have known a great many ministers who wanted to know 
"how they conld keep their congregation ont of the world. Give 
them so mnch to do that they won't have time to cherish worldly 
influences. This young lady of whom I was speaking came home, 
and her father and mother wanted her to shine in fashionable 
society. No, she said she had got something better than that. 
She went to the Sabbath-school superintendent, and said to him, 
"Can you give me a class in the Sunday-school?" He was sur- 
prised that this young lady should want that. He told her that 
he had no class he could give her then. 

CHASED BY THE OLD SHOEMAKER. 

She went away with a resolve to do what she could outside 
of the school. One day, as she was walking up the street, she 
saw a little boy running out of a shoemaker's shop, and behind 
him was the old shoemaker chasing him with a wooden last in his 
hand. He had not run far until the last was thrown at him, and 
he was struck in the back. The boy stopped and began to cry. 
The spirit of the Lord touched that young lady's heart and she 
went to where he was. She stepped up to him, and asked him if 
he was hurt. He told her it was none of her business. She went 
to work then to win that boy's confidence. She asked him if he 
went to school. He said, u No." "Well, why don't you go to 
school?" "Don't want to." She asked him if he would not like 
to go to Sunday-school. "If you will come," she said, "I will tell 
you beautiful stories and read nice books." 

She coaxed and pleaded with him, and at last said that if he 
would consent to go, she would meet him on the corner of a street 
which they should agree upon. He at last consented, and the 
next Sunday, true to his promise, he waited for her at the place 
designated. She took him by the hand and led him into the 
Sabbath-school. " Can you give me a place to teach this little 
boy?" she asked of the superintendent. He looked at the boy, 
but they didn't have any such looking little ones in the school. 
A place was found, however, and she sat down in the corner and 
tried to win that soul for Christ. 



"TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 321 

Many would look upon that with contempt, but she had got 
something' to do for the Master. The little boy had never heard 
anybody sing so sweetly before. When he went home he was 
asked where he had been. "Been among the angels," he told his 
mother. He said he had been to the Sabbath-school, but his 
father and mother told him he must not go there any more, or he 
would get a flogging. The next Sunday he went, and when he 
came home he got the promised flogging. He went the second 
time and got a flogging, and also a third time with the same result. 
At last he said to his father, "I wish you would flog me before I 
go, and then I won't have to think of it when I am there." The 
father said, "If you go to that Sabbath-school again I will kill 
you.'' 

HOW THE BOY SPENT HIS SATURDAYS. 

It was the father's custom to send his son out on the street to 
sell articles to the passers-by, and he told the boy that he might 
have the profits of what he sold on Saturday. The little fellow 
hastened to the young lady's house and said to her, "Father said 
that he would give me every Saturday to myself, and if you will 
just teach me then I will come to your house every Saturday after- 
noon." I wonder how many young ladies there are that would give 
up their Saturday afternoons just to lead one boy into the Kingdom 
of God. 

Every Saturday afternoon that little boy was there at her 
house, and she tried to tell him the w r ay to Christ. She labored 
with him, and at last the light of God's spirit broke upon his heart. 
One day while he was selling his wares at the railroad station, a 
train of cars approached unnoticed and passed over both his legs. 
A physician was summoned, and the first thing after he arrived, 
the little sufferer looked up into his face and said, " Doctor, will I 
live to get home?" "No," said the doctor, "yon are dying." "Will 
yon tell my mother and father that I died a Christian?" They 
bore home the boy's corpse and with it the last message that he 
died a Christian. 

Oh, what a noble work was that young lady's in saving that 

21 



322 "TO EVERY MAN HIS WORK." 

little wanderer ! How precious the remembrance to her! When 
she goes to heaven she will not be a stranger there. He will take 
her by the hand and lead her to the throne of Christ. She did the 
work cheerfully. Oh, may God teach us what our work is that we 
may do it for His glory. 

A PLEASURE DENIED TO ANGELS. 

It is the greatest pleasure of living to win souls to Christ, and 
it is a pleasure that angels can't enjoy. It is sometimes a wonder 
to me that God doesn't take the w r ork out from the church and give 
it to the angels. If the redeemed saints could return, I sometimes 
think they would rejoice in coming back here to have the privilege 
of leading one more soul to Christ. Isn't it high time that the 
church got awake from its midnight slumber? It is time the work 
was commenced, and when the spirit of God revives it, sha'n't we 
go and do it? Are there not 5000 Christians in this hall, and ain't 
there some one among them that can lead a soul to Christ within 
the next week? If we work, what a great army can be brought in, 
if we are only faithful. 

I want to say to the Christians here that there is one rule I 
have followed that has helped me wonderfully. I made it a rule 
that I would't let a day pass without speaking to some one about 
their soul's salvation, and if they didn't hear the Gospel from the 
lips of others, there will be 365 in a year that shall hear the Gospel 
from my lips. There are 5000 Christians here to-night ; can't they 
say, "We won't let a day pass without speaking a word to some 
one about the cause of Christ." 

At a place where we were holding meetings, in the gas works, 
there was a man who came to our very first meeting. He was 
very much interested, and said, " I will try and see if I can't lead 
'some of the men in my shop to Christ." He began to talk with 
/them. There were 175 men on the night watch, and when I left 
they said 25 out of 175 had been converted, and every night at 
midnight — that is the hour they have what might be called their 
midnight dinner — and every night at midnight they have a prayer- 
meeting. When you and I sleep at night all those young converts 



"TO EVERY MAin HIS WORK.' 323 

speak and pray, and it looks now as if every man in the gas works 
was going to be brought to Christ. 

When we were in Belfast, there was a man who heard about 
leading souls to Christ. He began by talking to his wife, and to 
his servant, and to his children, and jnst as we were leaving Belfast 
the)' were very nmch interested, bnt not converted. He came down 
to Dublin — broke up his home, left his business, and came to Dub- 
lin. One night he came to me very joyous, and he says, " My wife 
has been converted." A little while after he came and said, " My 
younger son has been converted ;" and a little while after he said, 
" My oldest son has been converted." And now the whole family 
is in the ark. And he came over to Manchester, and he came 
up to London, and now, perhaps, in all Belfast there is not one 
that works harder than that whole family. 

Look at this man's success. He found his work was right 
there in his own household ; and if the fathers and mothers, 
and sisters, and wives, and brothers, will try to bring the mem- 
bers of their families to Christ, and cry, " O God, teach me what 
my work is," the Spirit of God will surely tell them what their 
work is, and then if they are ready to go and do it, there will 
be thousands converted in this city in a few days. O, may the 
Spirit of the Lord come upon us to-night, and may every one 
of us be taught by the Holy Ghost what our work is, and may 
we be ready to do it. 



CHAPTER XXII. 
The Six "One Things." 

fWANT to call your attention this afternoon to six " One 
Things." The first, Mark x. 21 : " One thing thou lackest." 

We very often hear people say, " Oh, well ; he is a very good 
man," or, " She is a very, very good person ; but she lacks one 
thing," or, " He lacks one thing." But if that one thing is salva- 
tion, why, he lacks everything. You might say all that a dead 
man lacks is life. That is all. All that a beggar lacks is money 
to make him rich. Only one thing ! A sick man that is lying 
right on the borders of the eternal world only lacks his health to 
make him all right. 

That is one thing, but it is everything to a man that is sick. 
Money is everything to a man in want — a beggar; and if a 
man lacks salvation he lacks everything ; and it seems to me it 
would be well for us just to pause in life once in a while and ask 
ourselves the question, " Do we lack that one thing ?" Now, that 
young man spoken of here came to Christ, and Christ, beholding 
him, loved him. He was a noble young man. He tried to save 
himself by the law. He had the law and the prophets ; but when 
Christ just touched his heart — for he had his heart set on his pos- 
sessions — he found that he did not love God with all his heart; 
he did not love his neighbor as himself. He thought he did; 
but he didn't know himself. He spoke very well of himself. He 
had a good opinion of himself. 

There are a great many such people, and it is almost im- 
possible to do them good. It is a good deal better for God to 
say, " Well done !" than for us. It is a good deal better for 
God to say we lack nothing than it is for us to say ourselves 
we are not lacking. 

I am told Whitfield once was a guest of a General high in 
position, and Whitfield's courage failed him. He wanted to speak 

324 




REV. C. H. SPURGEON 

MR. MOODY'S FRIEND AND CO-LABORER IN LONDON 




REV. ARTHUR T. PIERSON, D. D. 

WHO WAS ASSOCIATED WITH MR. MOODY IN MANY OF HIS SERVICES 




PROFESSOR INGALLS OF ENGLAND 

CO-LABORER WITH MR. MOODY AT THE BIBLE INSTITUTE— CHICAGO 




PROFESSOR CASE 

MUSIC INSTRUCTOR AT THE BIBLE I NSTITUTE— CHICAGO 



THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 325 

to him about his soul, but he didn't have the courage. He was up 
late one evening and the next morning he was to go away early. 
The General was an old man, but he was one of those men that 
lacked that one thing. He lacked Christ and lacked salvation ; 
and Whitfield, when he went up stairs to retire, just took his 
diamond ring and wrote upon the pane of glass, " One thing thou 
lackest." And after Whitfield had gone some of the servants found 
that text of Scripture and spoke to the General about it, and God 
used that to bring the old soldier to his knees and into the king- 
dom. 

One thing thou lackest. My friends, do you lack Christ ? I 
was speaking once in Manchester on a platform very much higher 
than this, and right below me, in a seat close up to the platform, 
sat a man who strained his neck looking up at me all the time, 
and I looked right down on him and said : " My friend, won't you 
take Christ?" Said he, " I have got Him, thank God !" He did 
not lack Him. He had got Him ; and it is the privilige of every 
one here to have salvation and to know you have got it. 

LIGHT WHEN THE CLOUDS BREAK. 

Now when I was out at sea some time ago we had been in a 
fog and storm and darkness for a day or two and didn't know just 
where we were ; but the moment the clouds broke away a little and 
we could get a glimpse of the sun, we took an observation to find 
out where we were, and I think it would be well for sinners to take 
an observation and find out where they are. Have I a hope that 
will bear the light of eternity, or am I lacking that one thing that 
will be worth more than all the world when God calls me to stand 
for Him ? You know when a man comes to die, church order and 
government won't help him. It may be very well to ease a man's 
conscience, but when he comes to die, he wants a real, living, per- 
sonal Christ. That is the one thing to do. 

My friends, have you got Him ? " Oh, yes, I go to church every 
Sunday." Well, that is not having Christ. Ycu may go to church 
and lack Christ. " But I say my prayers." Yes, a man can say 
his prayers, too, and yet lack Christ. I suppose no one prayed 



32G THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 

more than Saul did in Jerusalem ; at least he thought he prayed, 
The time he really prayed was when he got near to God and cried 
out, " Lord, what will Thou have me to do?" That prayer came 
right out of his heart and not out of the prayer-book. He cried 
right out what he felt. 

There are a good many that are just going through the 
forms. They have got the form but they have not got Christ. 
Now, my friends, let us be honest to-da3< T , and let us see if we 
lack that one thing. If we do let us not rest until we have it. 
" One thing thou lackest ; and the young man turned away sor- 
rowful." 

VAGUE HOPE IS NOT ASSURANCE. 

The next thing I want to call your attention to is in the 
9th chapter of John. It is on assurance, because after we have 
got Christ the next thing is to know it. I have spoken some- 
times about assurance, but I wish I could speak about it every 
day until I could get the Church of God to look into the subject. 
Suppose I should meet you when you go out of here, and should 
take 3^ou by the hand and should ask " Are you a Christian ? " 
You would say, "I hope so ; I trust I am." They don't dare to 
say right out, u Yes, I am on the Lord's side," but the} 7 sa\- it in 
such a stammering way that the}' don't really believe it them- 
selves. 

Night after night we have asked people to speak to those near 
them and they dare not do it. I have learned this, that you can- 
not get men to work until they know the Saviour themselves. 
Now, this man says here : il I know that whereas I was blind, I 
now see." If God does open our eyes we know it. They tried to 
make him believe Christ was nothing but a man, but, said he, 
" Haven't I been feeling my way through the world for twent}'-nve 
years, and don't I know I can see now?" They could not beat 
that out of him. All the philosophy and science of the present 
day could not beat that out of him that whereas he was blind now 
he could see. All the Scribes and Pharisees could not beat it out 
of him. He said, "I know I see;" and so, my friends, it is the 



THE SIX "ONE THINGS.'' 327 

privilege of every one to have Christ, and to know we have Him. 
This idea that we have got to go on through the world is a 
terrible uncertainty. We cannot tell whether we have got to spend 
eternity in heaven or hell. Some people say : " How are you going 
to be sure until you have got the judgment ? You have got to wait 
until you are brought before the Judge." Thank God, we are not 
ever going to be brought into judgment. " Don't it eay every one 
shall be brought into judgment?" they ask. Yes, but that is 
already passed. I have been brought into judgment nearly one 
thousand eight hundred years ago at Calvary. If Christ was not 
Judge for me, who was He Judge for? If He didn't settle the 
claims of sin, what did He go into judgment for? What does the 
cross mean if it was not for judgment? 

QUESTION OF SIN ALREADY SETTLED. 

But they say : " Don't it say in Corinthians, every man must 
give an account of himself for the deeds done in the body ?" Cer- 
tainly, every one must give an account of his stewardship, but not 
for sin. That is already settled. Don't it say in the Scripture : 
" Know ye not that your sin shall not be mentioned against you ?" 
We are going to sit upon the throne at the right hand of God himself. 
We are not going into judgment. 

The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life. If 
I didn't get eternal life twenty-one years ago, when I was converted, 
what did I get? Then if we get it ought we not to know it ? It is 
a terrible delusion of Satan, and I believe hundreds of Christian 
people are being deceived by Satan now on this one point, that they 
have not got the assurance of salvation just because they are not 
willing to take God at His word. " But," a man said to me, " no 
one has come back, and we don't know what is in the future. It is 
all dark, and how can we be sure ?" Thank God ! Christ came 
down from heaven, and I would rather have Him, coming as He 
does right from the bosom of the Father, than any one else. We 
can rely on what Christ says, and He says, "He that believeth on 
Me shall not perish, but have everlasting life." Not that we are 
going to have it when we die, but right here to-day. 



328 THE SIX "ONE THINGS.'' 

And another thing : I don't believe we will have any peace or 
comfort or joy until this question of assurance is settled. Some 
people say, " It is presumption for you to stand up there and say you 
know you are saved." I say it is presumption for me to stand up 
here and say I doubt it when God has said it. Shall I doubt God's 
own word ? 

But you say it is too good to be true. Then you must go and 
settle that thing with the Lord, not with me. I take it as I find it in 
the Word of God. Do you think He is going to leave His children 
down here in the dark world to go through life with terrible uncer- 
tainties, not knowing whether we are going to glory or perdition ? 
There is no knowledge like that of a man who knows he is 
saved, who can look up and see his "title clear to mansions in 
the skies." 

EMPEROR MADE HIM CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD. 

It is said of Napoleon that while he was reviewing his army 
one day, his horse became frightened at something, and the Em- 
peror lost his rein, and the horse went away at full speed, and the 
Emperor's life was in danger. He could not get hold of the rein, 
and a private in the ranks saw it, and sprang out of the ranks 
towards the horse, and was successful in getting hold of the horse's 
head at the peril i\f his own life. The Emperor was very much 
pleased. Touching his hat, he said to him, " I make you Captain 
of my Guard." The soldier didn't take his gun and walk up there. 
He threw it away, stepped out of the ranks of the soldiers, and 
went up to where the body-guard stood. The captain of the body- 
guard ordered him back into the ranks, but he said "No! I won't 
go!" "Why not?" " Because I am Captain of the Guard." "You 
Captain of the Guard?" "Yes," replied the soldier. "Who said 
it?" and the man pointing to the Emperor, said, "He said it." 

That was enough. Nothing more could be said. He took the 
Emperor at his word. My friends, if God says anything let us 
take Him at His word. "He that believeth on the Lord Jesus 
Christ shall not perish, but have everlasting life." Don't you 
believe it? Don't you believe you have got everlasting life? It 



THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 329 

can be the privilege of every child of God here to-day to believe 
and then know that yon have got it. 

How is a man going to do all this if he does not think he. 
has got the foundation ready, if he does not know he has eter- 
nal life ? How is he going to add all these virtues and build up 
that monument if he has not that assurance? Do you not see 
that it is the privilege of every one of God's dear children here 
to-day to know that they have eternal life? Christ is ours for time 
and eternity; He will never leave us. It seems to me that we 
want this doctrine preached and taught now so that the Christians 
of this city will be helped to go to work and begin to talk to 
others. 

WE CANNOT SPEAK FOR OTHERS. 

Make it personal. One thing I know — I cannot speak for 
others, but I can speak for myself ; I cannot read other minds and 
other hearts; I cannot read the Bible and lay hold for others; 
but I can read for myself, and take God at His Word. The 
great trouble is that people take eve^thing in general, and do not 
take it to themselves. Suppose a man should say to me, "Moody, 
there was a man in Europe who died last w r eek, and left five million 
dollars to a certain individual." "Well," I say, "I don't doubt 
that: it's rather a common thing to happen," and I don't think 
anything more about it. But suppose, he says, "But he left the 
money to you." Then I pay attention; I say, "To me?" "Yes, 
he left it to you." I become suddenly interested, and want to 
know all about it. 

So w T e are apt to think Christ died for sinners ; He died for 
everybody, and for nobody in particular. But when the truth 
comes to me that eternal life is mine, and all the glories of Heaven 
are mine, I begin to be interested. I say, "Where is the chapter 
and verse where it says I can be saved?" If I put myself in 
among sinners, and take the place of a sinner, then it is that sal- 
vation is mine, and I am sure of it for time and eternity. 

In the first chapter of Luke, the 41st verse, we read of Mary's 
choice. After we have been saved, the next thing is to sit at the 



330 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 

feet of Jesus, and learn of Him, as Mary did. That is God's col- 
lege. Yon may go through Andover and Princeton and Yale and 
Harvard, or an} T and all of the colleges, but if you don't go to 
God's college God will not use you for His cause. He sends His 
teachers all out from there. We must learn at the feet of Jesus 
from His lips. A man who prayed at Jesus' feet did not have his 
prayers answered in the way he expected them to be. He wanted 
to stay there. He prayed to be allowed to sit at Jesus' feet forever. 
"No," said Christ, "go and tell what great things the Lord hath 
done for you." 

The first news that came to the disciples that Christ had risen 
came from the two Marys. They came and fell at the feet of the 
Saviour, and He said to them, "Go, publish what thou hast seen; 
go, tell the tidings." He said to Mary, "She hath the one thing 
needful," and that was to sit at the fountain and drink of the 
wisdom of the Saviour. The disciples were called disciples because 
they were to learn of Him. The young converts who are not 
willing to study Christ and learn of Jesus, are not fit for His 
service. They must go to God's college and learn of Him. 

NOT WILLING TO HEAR HIS VOICE. 

Martha was like many who are willing to work for God, to 
do something for Him, but are not willing to pause and hear the 
voice of Jesus. Hundreds of good people are willing to do all 
they can, but they are not willing to stop and hear the voice of the 
Lord and receive instruction from Him. He says, "It is more 
blessed to give than receive." Mary took her place of receiving, 
and was content to put the Lord in His place of giving something. 
She chose the good part. I think if I had Christ in my house 
to-night, I would feel like not doing anything, like letting the 
supper go, and sitting at His feet to ask Him questions and listen 
to the answers. It is better if we are going to work for God to be 
alone with Him a great deal. 

There are two lives that Christians lead; one before the 
world, wherein we manifest God; and there is a life that we must 
live alone with God, and sitting at the feet of Jesus Christ. The 



THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 33] 

longer I live and the older I grow, the more convinced I am that 
there are times when we must sit quietly at the feet of Jesus, and 
only let God speak to our souls. O, young friend, learn that 
lesson. It will save 3-011 many a painful hour. Just keep quietly 
alone, and learn of Jesus. 

You know it is when a man is alone with his wife that he 
tells her the precious secrets of his soul. It is not when the 
family are around, or when there is company there. So, when we , 
want to get the secrets of heaven we want to be alone with Jesus, 
and listen that He may come and whisper to our souls. The richest 
hours I have ever had with God have not been in great assemblies 
like this, but sitting alone at the feet of Jesus. 

TOO BUSY TO ATTEND TO IT. 

But, in these days of steam and telegraph, we cannot get time 
to listen to Christ's whisper in our ears. We are so busy we do 
not choose that one thing needful. If we did, we would not talk 
so much as we would listen, and when we did speak it would be 
only when we had something to say. We would hear words that 
came from the Master, and they would burn down deep into our 
souls and bring forth fruit. 

In the 20th chapter of Matthew, 8th verse, you read the 
words, "One is your Master." Ah, to learn who is your Master 
and serve Him only ! We are willing to serve our friends, to serve 
the church, to serve the public, and please every one, and forget 
the Lord. But we should just have one master, and live to please 
him alone, and He should be the Lord of Glory. He is a good 
Master. I want to recommend Him to you here to-day. If He 
is not your Master, then the devil is. Every one has a master, 
and that master is either Satan or Christ. 

You may not acknowledge it, you may not know it, but either 
the Lord of Glory or else the Prince of the Powers of Darkness is 4 
the one you serve. Satan is a hard and cruel master. If you 
make mistakes under him, he will have no mercy for you. When 
you get into trouble, if you are in his service, you will have to 
suffer indeed; but with the Lord of Glory for your master, if you 



332 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 

make mistakes or fall into error, all you have to do is to go and 
confess to Him, and He will forgive yon qnickly and smile upon 
yon, and restore to } T ou the jo} T of salvation if yon have lost it. 
O, that we might learn the sweet lesson that "One is our Master." 
and that One is Christ in Heaven. 

Those men who are trying to serve the public, what do they 
gain? I puy those men in Washington who are trying to serve 
the public. We send them there and then turn and abuse them. 
Public men get nothing but abuse, after all. It is a hard thing to 
serve the public; but it is a glorious thing to serve Christ. I 
would a thousand times rather have Him for tuy master than the 
cruel, heartless, wretched world, To know that we have only one 
master, but one to please and to serve ; to live with that idea in view 
all the while — one to please and one to glorify — is a most blessed 
thing. 

THE JOY OF SELF SACRIFICE. 

He is not a hard master. He knows we are liable to mistakes, 
and He is ready and willing to forgive. If Christ is such a glori- 
ous Master should we not be willing to sacrifice ourselves to Him 
and give up all and follow Him, and turn our back upon this fleet- 
ing world and live for Him ? When our country was in danger, 
how men laid down their lives and gave up everything for their 
country. The moment Abraham Lincoln called for six hundred 
thousand men you could hear the tramp of their feet in every direc- 
tion, and the song went up from all quarters, " We are coming, 
Father Abraham, six hundred thousand strong.'' All Mr. Lincoln 
had to do was to call, and the men came pouring in. 

Christ is calling for laborers. There are nations perishing 
for the want of Gospel tidings. We are a long time getting them 
to the world. America has men enough and money enough to do 
it all, to send the Gospel around this globe. It is high time that 
this Gospel was proclaimed in every town and village and hamlet 
throughout the whole world. It would be very easy if God's dis- 
ciples would work together for it. 

Oh, my friends, if we have such a glorious Master, who has 



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THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 333 

passed through heaven and is sitting on the right hand of God, 
calling for laborers, shall we withhold our lives and affection ? 
Shall we not go into the vineyard and work for Him ? It is a 
glorious thing to have such a Master, a high exalted privilege to 
be a co-worker with God. Let us remember our Chieftain has gone 
on before. He bears even now at the throne of God those scars 
He received here for our sakes ; He suffered and endured the cross, 
despising the shame, for the glory that was before him. Shall we 
excuse ourselves from work ? Shall we say : " Do not send me, 
Lord; send some one else?" Oh, just go into the heat of the 
battle ! There has never been a time in your life or mine when 
we could work for our Lord and see such immediate fruits and 
results. It seems to me that all w r e have to do is to sow with one 
hand and reap with the other. The harvest seems to be white ; 
the fields are waiting for the sickle ; the voice of our Master is call- 
ing us. Shall we hear that call in vain ? Are there not thousands 
that shall say " Lord, use me!" You, mothers, can be used; you, 
young man, can be used among your companions ; you, gray haired 
men, can be used in your declining days. Shall we not all go to 
work for Him while yet there is time ? 

DOING ONE THING. 

There is " one thing" that Paul speaks of : u One thing I do." 
Some one has said that the man who does one thing is a terrible 
man. I like to see those Christians who have a definite work and 
are doing it. I like to see them work in view of the heat and 
the burden of the day and never weaken. I suppose it will turn 
out in this city as it has in a great many other places where we 
have been, where a great many, having received a new spirit, are 
asking what they shall do. They are quickened into new life ; 
they are all full of soul, full of life, and the fire burns in their 
souls, and they want to publish the tidings of salvation. 

The cry is, " What shall I do ?" Let me say to you, find some 
one thing and do it well. Do not think anything you do for the 
Lord is a little work. What seems to you a little work may be 
the most mighty thing that has ever been done. You are a teacher 



334 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 

in a Sunday-school, for example, and have a class of little boys ; 
you do not know what those boys may become. There may be a 
Luther, there may be a Whitfield, there may be a John Bunyan 
there. You may call these little boys to Christ, and they may go 
out and move the world as Luther did. 

No one ever thought that little monk would become so mighty 
in God's hand. He shook the whole world ; the spirit of the Liv- 
ing God came upon him. The dark clouds that settled upon his 
nation were lifted and beaten back. He drove them back. It is a 
great thing to turn one soul to Christ. O, find some one thing to 
do for the Saviour, and do it well. " This one thing I do," said 
Paul. If he had folded his arms and said, " O dear, the Christians 
are so cold we cannot do anything ; if the church was wide-awake 
we might." 

YOU SHOULD KEEP AWAKE. 

Never you mind whether the church is wide-awake or not ; you 
keep wide-awake yourself. If you wait for the church you will 
never do anything. I made up my mind ten years ago that I would 
go on as if there were not another man in the world but me to do 
the work. I knew I had to give my account of stewardship. I 
suppose they say of me, u O, he is a radical; he is a fanatic ; he 
only has one idea." Well, it is a glorious idea. I would rather 
have that said of me than be a man of ten thousand ideas and do 
nothing with them. To have one idea, and that idea Christ, that 
is the man for me ; that is the man we want now. 

A man that has one idea, one desire, one thought, and that 
idea, that thought, that desire Christ and Him crucified — that is 
what this groaning, perishing world wants now. It can get on 
without our rhetoric ; it can get on without our fine speeches, with- 
out our eloquence. It does not want them ; it wants Christ and 
Him crucified. Let that old colored man find his work and go 
about it ; let that young lady find her work and do it. 

Don't go and get discouraged when you get to work because 
you don't find everything prosperous as you expected. You cannot 
tell what will prosper. What you think is prosperity may turn out 



THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 335 

to be the worst thing you could have done, and the thing you have 
least hope of maj' turn out to be your greatest success. 

An old woman who was seventy-five years old had a Sabbath- 
school two miles away among the mountains. One Sunday there 
came a terrible storm of rain, and she thought at first she would 
not go that day, but then she thought, "What if some one should 
go and not find me there ? " Then she put on her waterproof, and 
umbrella, and over-shoes, and away she went through the storm, 
two miles away, to the Sabbath-school in the mountainSc When 
she got there she found one solitary young man, and taught him 
the best she knew how all the afternoon. She never saw him 
again, and I don't know but the old woman thought her Sabbath 
had been a failure. 

OLD WOMAN RECEIVED A LETTER. 

That week the young man enlisted in the army, and in a year 
or two after the old woman got a letter from the soldier thanking 
her for going through the storm that Sunday. This young man 
thought that stormy day he would just go and see if the old 
woman was in earnest, and if she cared enough about souls to go 
through the rain. He found she came and taught him as carefully 
as if she was teaching the whole school, and God made that the 
occasion of winning that young man to Christ. When he lay dying 
in a hospital he sent the message to the old woman that he would 
meet her in heaven. 

Was it not a glorious thing that she did not get discouraged 
because she had but one school and scholar? Be willing to woik 
with one. Bear in mind the words, " This one thing I do." I live 
for souls and for eternity ; I want to win some soul to Christ. If 
you want this and work for it, eternity alone can tell the result. 
May God give us a passion for souls. 

When Joshua was one hundred and ten years old, the old war- 
rior lay dying, and he called the Elders in Israel around him, and 
as they gathered around his bedside, he gave these words as his 
dying testimony. There stand the Elders in Israel and he was the 
last one of the great leaders alive. Moses was gone, Aaron was 



336 THE SIX "ONE THINGS." 

gone ; lie was the only man that was at Mount Sinai when the law 
was given from on high. They stood around his bedside and heard 
his dying testimony. How it shined out. u Behold this day I am 
going the way of all the earth ; and ye know in your hearts and in 
your souls that not one thing hath failed of all the good things 
that the Lord your God spoke concerning you." 

Is not that a high tribute? Had not God kept his word to 
them ? The old warrier is going to rest, and this is his dying 
testimony: u Not one thing has failed. All things have been 
fulfilled." That is what the man has said who has tried God. 
Infidels won't try God, and of course they do not have such a 
peaceful end as the man who has taken God at his word. Let us 
look over the six one things. " One thing thou lackest.'' Do you 
lack Christ ? Oh, take Him to-day ! " One thing I know. " Do you 
know you have got Christ? If you do not, do not go out of this 
house to-day without knowing it; step into the inquiry-room and 
talk with some of the Christian men and women who know they 
have salvation. 

Make up your mind you will not leave this house to-day till 
you can look up and read your " title clear to mansions in the sky." 
I would rather do that than have a title to all this city. I would 
rather have some poor soul that I have won from this dark world 
to Christ come and weep over my grave when I am gone, than to 
have a monument of pure gold reaching from the earth to the skies. 
The next "one thing" is the "one thing that is needful." "One 
is your master," "Not one thing has failed," and "One thing I 
do," — it is the privilege of each one to have all these "one things" 
and to know that you have them. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

Christ's Call to Peter. 

WANT to call your attention this afternoon to the life of Peter. 

If you will just turn your Bibles to the first chapter of John, 40th 

verse, that is the first glimpse we get of him : " One of the 
two which heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon 
Peter's brother. He first findeth his own brother, Simon, and saith 
unto him, we have found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, 
the Christ. And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus 
beheld him, He said, Thou art Simon, the Son of Jona; thou shalt 
be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, a stone." That is 
John's first account of Peter and Christ's meeting, the first time 
they met. Then in Matthew, in the 4th chapter, 18th verse, we 
find that they met again, and I have an idea that that account in 
John was that Peter was called to be a disiciple, a follower of 
Christ; but in Matthew, iv., 18, he is called from his business, his 
occupation, to become an apostle and a worker in the vineyard. 

The 1 8th verse says: "And Jesus, walking by the sea of 
Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his 
brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers. And 
He saith unto them, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. 
And they straightway left their nets, and followed Him." 

One thought I want to call your attention to is this: that 
before a man leaves his occupation, whatever his business may 
be, to give his whole life and service to God, he must be sure he 
has got the call, " Follow thou me." I think there are great mis- 
takes being made every year by men who would make good far- 
mers, carpenters, and mechanics, perhaps by those who would make 
good business men, giving up their occupation and attempting to 
preach, to work for God. 

Now, I don't know how many men have come to me during 
the past few months and asked my advice about their going into 
22 337 



338 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

the ministry. I never advised a man in my life to go into the 
ministry. I don't think I ever shall, for I think the ministry is too 
high a calling for a man to be influenced to enter it by anybody. 
He must get a higher call than from man. He wants to get a call 
from above. If God calls him into His service, to leave all and 
become a " fisher of men," he won't fail. One reason why so many 
break down in the pulpit is because they run before they are sent, 
in fact before they are called at all, and the result is so many 
failures. Now let us be sure we have got a call before we give up 
our business to go into the service of the Lord, and one good way 
to tell whether you have got that call is : Has God used you ? 

TRIED BY A PRACTICAL TEST. 

I think Wesley had a good idea of it. When a man came to 
him and asked him if he should enter the ministry, he used to ask 
him: u Has God blessed you? Have there been any souls con- 
verted under your efforts ? How is it when you preach ; do people 
go to sleep under it or wake up ? Do some get mad and some get 
converted ?" He thought that was a good sign that they had been 
called to the ministry, for that is what the Gospel does, for it wakes 
up some and brings them to the feet of Christ. It is better if they 
get mad, for then there is some hope of their getting over it and 
becoming Christians ; but if they go to sleep they may make up 
their minds they are not called. We don't want that. 

Now, undoubtedly, Peter, after he met Christ, went about fish- 
ing, and undoubtedly he was a successful man at that work. He 
stayed there until Christ came along one day and told him, " Follow 
me/' There is something very sweet about this, that when He 
called Peter to His service the thing He said was, " Follow me." 
Christ said to Peter, " Follow thou me," and as long as Peter fol- 
lowed Him he was successful. As long as any of us will follow 
Christ we will be successful, successful in everything we under- 
take to to do. Christ never failed in anything He undertook to do. 
God never failed. It is man that is constantly failing ; but if we 
get our orders from above and God calls us we cannot fail. It is 
utterly impossible. 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 339 

So now we find Christ coining along and saying to Peter, 
M Follow me." And lie left his fishing smack and business to go 
with Him. It says here they "forsook" them. It don't say they 
took their nets and their old boats, and disposed of them. They 
didn't stop to sell them, or have an auction of them. They had 
got the highest call a man ever got, and so they just left all and 
followed Him. It says in Luke that he gave them one chance. 
He told them to throw their net in and have one good haul, and 
when they attempted to pull in their net it broke, there was such 
a multitude of fishes in it ; and He called them away from their 
nets, and boats, and fish, and they followed Him straightway. 

And let me say to any man or woman here that if Christ calls 
you to go into His vineyard, and leave father and mother, you 
should go ; but be sure you have got the call. It is God who will 
then stand by you, and you cannot fail. 

SHUT UP IN DOUBTING CASTLE. 

Now, in Matthew xiv. 28, we find Peter again. There we see 
that he has got into doubts. How many people get into doubting 
castles ? Peter got to doubting, and the result was he got into 
trouble, as all Christians do when they get to doubting. The Lord 
appeared to Him walking on the water, andi he calls out to Him, 
" Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto Thee on the water," 
and the Lord said, " Come !" and when Peter was come down out 
of the ship he walked on the water to Jesus, but when he saw the 
wind was boisterous he was afraid. 

Ah, that is it. He got his eye off Christ and got to thinking 
about the wind and the waves and the storm. He had made a good 
start, a good beginning, and some of you young converts want to 
take heed right here. This is the great danger. You get to look- 
ing away from Christ ; you begin to look at the obstacles and the 
difficulties in the way, and you get full of fear, and down you go. 
It was a noble act of Peter when he got out of that ship and put 
his foot on the water. He had got the word of God. God told 
him to do it, and the water was as hard as stone to him, because 
God's word was there, and he ought not to have doubted when he 



340 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

got half-way over. His word was enough, and He could make 
that sea like a whole mountain of rock. 

There was no trouble if he had only kept his eye on Christ, 
looking to Jesus. Christ said, "Come," and he started all right; 
but ah ! the wind made a great noise and he could hear the waves 
dashing right up against him, and he walked right on the top of 
them. His foot did not probably sink an eighth of an inch in the 
water. There was no danger, but he got his eye off of Christ, and 
he was full of doubts and fears, and the result was, down he went. 
How many have fallen in the same way. "But when he saw the 
wind was boisterous he was afraid ; and beginning to sink he cried, 
saying, Lord save me. 

LOOKING AT THE HUGE WAVES. 

"And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught 
him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou 
doubt?" "What made you doubt, Peter? Didn't I tell you to 
come ? Wherefore did you doubt ?" Oh, the Saviour don't like 
these doubts. I wish we could get the Church of God out of 
Doubting Castle. I wish we could get away from these doubts 
that hinder us so much. We are all the time looking at the wind 
and the waves, and are full of doubt. How many Christians go 
through the world trembling all the time and all their life, because 
they are afraid of the storm and of the troubles they think may 
come upon them. Just think of the promises of God. Just let 
us walk right out on them. The Lord has promised never to 
forsake us. We have nothing to fear. "Fear not." All through 
Scripture that word comes out again and again. " Fear not! I 
have thee by the right hand." 

I want now to call your attention to Peter's confession. He 
made an open confession. I think the edict had gone forth from 
the Sanhedrim the day before that if any one should confess Christ, 
"put him out." They would not have Him, and so now, it might 
have been the very next day, He is trying His disciples. "When 
Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea and Philippi, He asked His 
disciples, saying, "Whom do men say that I am?" Perhaps this 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 341 

edict had gone forth. " You are around among the people, preach- 
ing in the towns and villages, and whom do the people say I am ? 
What do they say ?" 

"Well, some say that Thou art John the Baptist, and some 
say Elias, and others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets, " and He 
saith unto them, " But whom say ye that I am ?" 

There was the question brought home to them. They had 
strong faith in Him, and strong love for Him, but they would not 
confess Him because if they did they would go out of the Syna- 
gogue. "Now, whom do you say I am?" "And Simon Peter 
answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." 

PETER'S FRANK CONFESSION. 

That is who He was — Christ, the Son of the living God. That 
put Peter out of the Synagogue. He could not get in after that. 
He had made his confession. "And Jesus answered and said unto 
Him : Blessed art thou Simon Barjona ; for flesh and blood hath 
not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." It 
seems as if Christ was always, when down here, was all the time 
trying to find some one willing to confess Him. It was to Him 
like a cup of water to a thirsty man to find in this dark world a 
man ready to say He was all He professed to be. 

There are men now trying to make out that Jesus was not the 
Lord divine, the Lord of glory, the Lord of heaven ; that He was 
not what He professed to be ; but, ah ! thank God ! there were some 
men that believed in Him, stood by Him, confessed Him, were not 
ashamed of Him ; and, thank God! they live to-day, their influence 
lives to-day, here in this city, at the close of the nineteenth century, 
because they took their stand and were not ashamed to confess 
Him. 

But now turn to the 9th chapter of Luke, 28th verse. Here 
is Peter turning his eyes toward Rome, getting to worship the 
saints, and not knowing the difference between Christ and Moses 
and Elias. The idea that Peter should put Christ on the same 
level with Elias and Moses. " And it came to pass about eight 
days after these sayings, He took Peter and John and James and 



342 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

went tip into a mountain to pray. And as He prayed, the fashion 
of His countenance was altered, and His raiment was white and 
glistening. And, behold, there talked with Him two men, which 
were Moses and Elias; who appeared in glory, and spake of His 
decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem. 

" But Peter and they that were with Him were heavy with sleep; 
and when they were awake they saw His glory and the two men 
that stood with Him. And it came to pass as they departed from 
Him Peter said unto Jesus, Master, it is good for us to be here. 
And let us make three tabernacles, one for Thee and one for Moses 
and one for Elias ; not knowing what he said." 

THEY MAKE HIM A MERE MAN. 

That is what some men are trying to do — put Christ on the 
same level with other men. They say, " Yes, Christ was a very 
good man ; so was Moses, and so was Elias. He was a very good 
man, and we have a profound respect for Him, but don't say He 
was divine." Why, this makes Christ out the greatest liar in the 
world, if He is not divine, if He was not more than Moses and 
Elias. He was a liar and the greatest deceiver that ever came into 
this world if He was not divine. God says, " Thou shalt have no 
other gods before Me." Look at the millions that are worshiping 
Him to-day. Every one of them is thus breaking the first com- 
mandment: not only breaking that, but it is a commandment the 
violation of which God punishes as He does no others. 

It seemed to be a sin that God abominated above all others. 
How He punished the Jews because they had another God. God is 
a jealous God, and do you think He would allow these millions for 
1800 years to worship His Son and adore Him if He was not God 
in the flesh? Ah, my friends, if you want to please a father speak 
well of his son. You are driven to one or two alternatives — that 
He was either the Lord or else the greatest impostor that ever came 
into this world. " While He thus spake, there came a cloud, and 
overshadowed them; and they feared as they entered into the cloud. 
And there came a voice out of the cloud, saying, This is my 
beloved Son; hear Him." 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 343 

You see God snatched them both away and said, " That is my 
beloved Son; hear Him" When Peter came to put Moses and 
Elias on a level with His Sou, God would not have it, and snatched 
them both away, and they have never been on earth since. 

Let us look into the 6th chapter of John for a moment. Peter 
believed in assurance. Look at the 66th verse. " From that time 
many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. 
Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away ? Then 
Simon Peter answered Him, Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou 
hast the words of eternal life." That is an old saying. How has 
it rung down through the ages. I should like to ask you here to- 
da}r, suppose you leave Christ, to whom can you go? Go to the 
world: what can it give you? Where are you going to? To 
w horn can we go ? Peter was right. They had left all for Jesus, 
and they had no desire to go back. 

THE WORLD AFFORDS NO SATISFACTION. 

I never saw a Christian in my life with his eyes open that 
wanted to go back. He has got nowhere to go. The world is 
spoiled for him. Peter had got his eyes upon the better world, 
where sickness and death and sorrow never comes, and do you think 
a man having his affection set upon that City, and having got a 
glimpse of it, wants to leave for this world again ? This world is 
empty and hollow, and cannot satisfy the longing of our heart. 
And I never saw a man living for this world that was satisfied ; 
but Christ satisfies the longings of the heart. 

Here Christ had been lifting the standard pretty high on ac- 
count of those men whom He knew had an empty profession, and 
no love for Him. Christ wanted heart-love. Many followed Him 
without love, and He knew that when trials and persecutions came 
they would all leave Him, and they might as well go that after- 
noon ; and He lifted the standard pretty high ; and He turns to 
Peter and says, "Are you going to leave me, too?" Peter says no. 
" Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words of eternal 
life." 

And so if there is a Christian here to-day who wants to turn 



344 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

back, where are you going to turn ? What can the world give ? 
What can the god of this world do for you ? He is a liar and a 
deceiver, and every man and woman under his power has been and 
will be deceived down to the end of time. 

But now I am going to Peter's fall, for that is the object of this 
lecture. I want to call your attention to the fall of Peter, so as to 
warn these young converts and Christians that have just com- 
menced a new life. You will find the first step of his fall in Mat- 
thew xxvi. 33 : " Peter answered and said unto Him, Though all 
men shall be offended because of Thee, yet will I never be offended. 
Jesus said unto him, Verily, I say unto thee that this night before 
the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. Peter said unto Him, 
Though I should die with Thee, yet will I not deny Thee. Likewise 
also said all the disciples." 

SELF-CONFIDENCE WAS HIS DOWNFALL. 

Now the thought I want to call your attention to is this : Peter 
was self-confident, and wherever you see a Christian so confident 
and boasting of himself and reflecting on others, you may doubt 
the permanency of his zeal. Peter tells the Lord that, " though 
James and John and all deny Thee, I will not den}' Thee." He casts 
a reflection on all of them, as if he was stronger than the rest. 
There is one thing the Lord cannot have, and that is His disciples 
boasting in their strength. 

When a man thinks he has got a good deal of strength, and is 
self-confident, you may look for his downfall. It ma}' be years 
before it comes to light, but it is already commenced. Peter did not 
fall at once, but it was gradual and sure. The thing to do is to 
stand, and take heed least ye fall. Beware ! We have got terrible 
enemies, and we are very weak in ourselves. All our strength is 
borrowed strength. We get it from Christ. I don't think there is 
a disciple in this house but what would fall in sin within twenty- 
four hours if it were not for the wonderful grace of the Lord Jesus 
Christ keeping us. See how the most wonderful men of Scripture 
have fallen, and fallen on their strongest points. 

Look at Moses, the very last man that would have spoken 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 345 

unadvisedly with his lips, slow of speech ; you would not think 
that was the man that would strike that rock and be kept out of 
the promised land. You would not think Elijah, who could stand 
against Herod and all his royalty, and all those eight hundred and 
fifty prophets of Baal, and against the whole nation, was going to 
be scared by one woman. He supposed he was strong, but a mes- 
sage came from the Queen, and she said, "Thy life will be like 
those of the false prophets in twenty-four hours," and away he went 
off into the desert, and the Lord found him there hidden away. 

THE STRONGEST ARE WEAK. 

When you find men like Elijah, Moses, and Peter, able, strong 
men, falling, it ought to make us tremble and bear in mind that 
our strength is in God and not in ourselves. We cannot afford to 
be self-confident. I tremble for these young converts. They say 
they are going to live for Christ all their days, and they are going 
to stand up for Him if the rest don't. That is not the kind of 
language. No, my friends, you ought to be very humble. Keep 
low, and if your strength is in God, and you are looking to Him 
for strength all the time, you will be able to stand ; and otherwise 
you will go. When Peters says, " I will not deny Thee," the Lord 
told him he would deny Him. Peter says, " I will die for Thee." 
" You will?" " Yes." Then the Lord answers, "This very night, 
before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me me thrice." " What, 
Lord, you don't think I would do such a thing as that ?" 

And so these young converts don't think they are going to 
fail, and there is the danger. We have got some terrible enemies, 
and therefore we ought to walk very humbly, and if we do so God 
will strengthen and keep us, but the moment we get self-confident 
and lifted up in our own sight, then the danger comes. There was a 
time when I was first converted when I used to think that when I 
got to be a Christian of twenty years' standing I should rejoice, 
because there would be no danger of my falling then. 

My friends, there is more danger now than there was then. 
Do you know why ? Because the more useful a man becomes the 
better target he is for the devil. The devil is more watchful to see 



346 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

if lie cannot trip him up, and the fall is a great deal more for a 
man that has risen to be used of God. The higher the man gets 
the greater the fall. Therefore, every man that is used of God 
ought to be very humble and keep down in the dust ; if he don't 
the enemy will come in some unguarded moment and he will fall 
into some sin. Not that we are going to lose our souls, not 
that Elijah or Peter were lost, but the devil is trying to weaken 
Peter's testimony, and how many good people there are in the 
world that have lost their testimony. Their testimony now is 
gone and God won't use them. 

MOVES HELL TO KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT. 

The wiles of the devil are many : first, he moves all hell to 
keep a man from coming to Christ, and if he does come in spite 
of the devil he moves all hell to keep his mouth closed, that he shall 
not speak for God, and if he cannot do that he uses all hell to 
blacken his character, and he will start lies about him. Some one 
says " a lie will go round the world before Truth gets his boots on," 
and the world will take it up and want to believe it whether they 
do or not. And when you come to trace it to its fountain-head, 
" Well," they say, " it was such a good joke they wanted it to go 
anyway, and they would not change it and it went." 

The world likes to believe a lie ; and so the children of God 
walk very circumspectly and carefully, so that their enemies should 
not have this chance of bringing up and blazing forth to the world 
all our failings. Peter got so self-confident that the Lord knew 
he would not be of any use after He was gone, and so he had to let 
Satan sift him. The Lord said to Peter, " Simon, Simon, behold 
Satan hath desired to have you that he may sift you as wheat, but I 
have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not ; and when thou art con- 
verted strengthen thy brethren." 

But now the hour comes for Peter's fall, and if you turn to 
Luke you will find he gives a very good account of it. I think it 
is the 2 2d chapter of Luke, beginning at the 45th verse: "And 
when He rose up from prayer, and was come to His disciples, He 
found them sleeping for sorrow." Now, He told them not to sleep. 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 347 

"Watch and pray," He had said, and they had done jnst what He 
told them not to do — they had gone to sleep. Now, the second step 
of Peter's downfall, after he became so confident, was his going to 
sleep after the Lord had told him he was to watch. One would 
have thought when the Lord told him he would deny Him that he 
would have kept himself awake, but now as the Lord was passing 
through that dreadful agony of Gethsemane and sweating great 
drops of blood — "and His sweat was as it were great drops of blood 
falling down to the ground," — these men could fall asleep and 
Peter among them. 

IN DANGER WHEN ASLEEP. 

And the devil can do most anything he wants to when we are 
asleep. The soul is never asleep. Bear that in mind; and I 
believe nineteen-twentieths of the people of America to-day are 
sound asleep. That is the reason why they cannot tell the differ- 
ence between the theatre and the opera and the church. A mother 
has a darling son, a youth of promise, and she sees him fond of the 
theatre and the opera and gives no check. She begins to wake 
up, and by-and-by finds herself before the corpse of this son, and 
then she realizes the truth at last. "Oh," she says, "what have I 
done? I have put the cup to his lips, and have fostered his love 
for the theatre, I have plunged him the first step downwards." Oh, 
may God wake up all the fathers and the mothers before it is 
too late. 

Peter got asleep and the devil could do anything with him 
after he was asleep. The next thing he wakes up out of his sleep 
and he is not in communion with Christ, he is a sleepy Christian ; 
and when they come to arrest Christ, Peter draws his sword and 
smote the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear. That 
was not the spirit of Christ. He had to go and heal that 
man's ear, and He rebuked Peter and told him to put up his sword. 
He did not come to ruin men, but to save them. He came to bless, 
to keep, and I should have thought that that would have broken 
Peter's heart to have had Christ heal that man's ear. Undoubtedly 
there was no scar there. 



348 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

But now they start back into the city with Christ. They have 
got him under arrest, and the next thing is, Peter follows Him 
afar off. This is the fourth step of Peter's downfall. When Chris- 
tians get to following Christ afar off you may know it won't be long 
before they will deny Him. If there was an}' night when Christ 
needed Peter it was that night. 

If there was an}' night when He needed His little band around 
Him it was that night, He did not want to be forsaken that night, 
but at that very hour Peter was following Him afar off. How many 
Christians to-day are following Him afar off. How the cause of 
Christ to-day needs everyone that professes to be a follower of Jesus, 
and how we ought to come out and follow Him boldly and gladly. 
The first words were "Follow me," as He took Peter from his 
business and now he follows Him afar off. 

PETER'S BASE DENIAL. 

The next thing is we find him with the enemies of Jesus 
Christ. It won't be long before from following afar off we will be 
with Christ's enemies. There he is among Christ's enemies. That 
is the next step, and at last one comes in and looks at him and 
says, u You are one of His disciples?" " No, I am not." He 
denies it. The man that had been with him for three years says, 
" I am not His disciple. I don't know Him." " I believe you are." 
" Well, I am not." I suppose he thought that was the end of it ; 
that it was all settled. A little while after another came and 
looked at him saying : " This man is one of that Galilean's fol- 
lowers." " I am not," says Peter. " I am not. Don't you accuse 
me of that. I tell you I don't know anything about it." "Well, 
you look very much like a man I have seen with Him. I was out 
there in the wilderness when he fed the five thousand, and if you 
are not one of the men who passed around the bread you look very 
much like him." And Peter says, " I am not the man. Don't you 
accuse me of that." 

Thus Peter denies Him. And by-and-by another man comes 
up and he, too, recognizes Peter and says, "Surely thou are one of 
His disciples, and Peter denies Him again. The third man comes 



CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 349 

up and says, "Thou are one of His disciples, for thy speech be- 
trayeth thee." And Peter got full of anger. His wrath was 
kindled and he cried out with an oath and swore, " I am not." I 
cannot use his language. 

A WARNING SOUND. 

Think of Peter swearing and cursing ! Undoubtedly, he was 
in the habit of swearing and cursing before Christ met him and 
the old sin came back upon him and he swore at Christ and said, 
" I never knew him." And away out in the street he heard a cock 
crow, and when the cock crew Christ turned round and looked at 
him. All he did was to look at him. He might have said. " Is 
it true you don't know Me ? You have been with Me three years. 
Have you forgotten when your mother was crying for help you 
wanted Me to raise her from sickness and make her well ? Have 
you forgotten how you wanted Me to make three tabernacles, one 
for Moses, one for Elias and one for Me ? Is it true you have for- 
gotten how, when you walked on the water, you began to sink and 
cried to Me for help that you might not perish ?" 

He might have reminded him of that, but the Lord didn't do 
that. He did not put the knife in him. All He did was to turn 
and give him one look, and it just broke Peter's heart. If there 
is a backslider here to-day may you just catch a glimpse of Christ 
looking down into your heart. It broke the heart of Peter, and I 
can see him springing to his feet and going out and weeping bit- 
terly. No one on earth knows what he suffered that night. I can 
imagine some of the disciples coming and telling him what had 
taken place, how Jesus had been condemned to death, and next, he 
hears that the Saviour is dead and that they have buried His body, 
and all that night how much Peter must have suffered. I can 
imagine it in his sleep even. 

Oh, what bitterness ! He was passing through the agonies of 
Gethsemane himself now. I can see him weeping and wailing, 
u Oh, that Christ had only forgiven me before He died !" He had 
no hope of His resurrection. He had forgotten all that Christ 
said about His coming back. But see how tenderly Christ treated 



350 CHRIST'S CALL TO PETER. 

him. When He came out of the grave He said, " Go back and 
tell My disciples." 

No doubt Peter thought he would be counted out. But no. 
He leaves a message for Peter : " Go tell Peter that I will meet 
him in Galilee." I cau imagine, when the disciple came to Peter 
and told him, " The Lord is raised , He sent a message to you," 
that Peter exclaimed, " What ! did He speak my name ?" " Yes, 
He said go and tell the disciples and Peter. He put your name 
in." "Oh," says Peter, " thank God for that! I will see Him," 
and away went Peter to see the Lord. He was eager to see Him, 
and we are told b}^ Paul here in Corinthians that he met Him 
alone. 

No one on earth knows what took place at that interview, but 
I can imagine the first time Peter saw Him he fell at His feet and 
washed them with his tears, and cried, li Lord forgive me!" But 
his self-confidence is all gone. 

PERTINENT QUESTIONS PUT TO PETER. 

When he met Him there at that breakfast on the sea-shore, 
when Christ prepared the feast — what a feast it must have been ! 
— He called them all around Him, and then said, " Peter, do you 
love Me more than these ? Do } T ou love Me more than John?" 
What does Peter say ? He S2iys } " Lord, you know." And then He 
sa}'S again, "Feed My lambs." " Lovest thou Me more than these, 
Peter?" said He, the second time, and then He said it the third 
time. It grieved poor Peter, I suppose, because he had denied 
Him three times ; and the last words the Lord said to him after 
He had fed him were, "Feed My lambs." And the last words 
before were, " Follow thou Me." 

O, Blessed Saviour ! if there is a wanderer from the fold here 
to-da}^, bring him back. If there is one following afar off, let him 
come to-day. I wish I had more time to talk about this wonderful 
character, but may it be a great help to us, and ma} T we be kept 
from falling. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

Decision. 

¥OU will find my text this afternoon in the 27th chapter of the 
gospel according to Matthew, part of the 2 2d verse : " What 
shall I then do with Jesus which is called Christ ?" Our 
last Sunday here has come, and I am speaking to many to-day 
that will probably not be here again. Even if you should all 
want to come you probably would not be able to; so to-day I want 
to press this question home upon you. For ten weeks we have 
been trying to preach to you about Christ, and tell you something 
about Him. To be sure we have done it very poorly, but now the 
time has come for us to close. It remains with you to say whether 
these meetings shall close and leave you out of the ark or in it. 
A good deal depends upon this afternoon's meeting. A solemn 
question and a personal one is before you; not what your neigh- 
bors and friends are going to do, but " what shall I do with 
Jesus ? " 

Pilate was in great difficulty. The question had been sprung 
upon him, as it were, suddenly. He had not heard about Christ 
for ten weeks, as you have, nor, as it may be, for twenty-five or 
forty or fifty years. He had not been proclaimed to Pilate as He 
has been proclaimed in this Christian land. 

We live within sight of the cross and of our Saviour glorified 
in heaven, but Pilate only saw Him in His humiliation, when He 
was condemned and cast out by His own nation. He was a 
heathen man, wakened perhaps suddenly early one Saturday 
morning, between the hours of six and seven, called into the judg- 
ment hall in great haste to pass sentence upon a man that they 
wanted to have put to death at once. They wanted him to sign the 
death-warrant. They did not want any trial or examination. 

But when Pilate looked at Him, he saw that he was a different 
prisoner from any he had had before. Pilate asked a few questions: 

351 



352 DECISION. 

"What do you bring against Him?" They said, "If lie was not 
a malefactor, we would not bring Him to you." So lie begins to 
question the prisoner, and before he had talked with Him long, he 
was convinced that never was such a prisoner brought before him. 
His judgment told him to release the man, his conscience told him 
to release Him. His heart, even his treacherous deceitful heart 
that was desperately wicked above all things, that very heart said 
"Release Him." His wife sent word, " Have thou nothing to do 
with that just man, for I have suffered much in a dream concerning 
Him;" but still Pilate had not the moral courage to stand and 
release the man. Herein he was not true to his own convictions. 

PILATE'S CASE OVER AGAIN. 

I believe that is the trouble with thousands of people that have 
been attending these meetings. I believe that if every man and 
woman that has been here had been true to their convictions, there 
would have been thousands more saved. Many a man and woman 
has gone out of this hall convinced that they were sinners, and 
that they ought to receive Christ, but yet they have rejected Him, 
just as Pilate did. Pilate was a vacillating character, wayward, and 
undecided. Reuben is spoken of as "unstable as water;" and that 
is the character of Pilate.. 

There are hundreds in this city in the same state of mind. 
Pilate was thoroughly convinced and aroused, knowing down deep 
in his heart that he ought to receive Christ ; but he was not willing 
to decide. People are vacillating. Another mistake Pilate made 
was that he was influenced by others. He first let the judgment 
go out of his own hands. He tried to get others to decide the 
matter for him, and every step he took carried him deeper and 
deeper into the pit. He got into difficulty every time he turned 
round, because he had not the moral courage to decide for himself 
what he would do with Christ. 

There was- another thing that weighed with him, and that was 
his worldly position and influence. If he decided against Him, he 
was afraid he would lose the favor of the Emperor of Rome; or if 
he decided against them, he might lose the favor of the leading men 



DECISION. 353 

at Jerusalem. He might have removed every difficulty, but he was 
afraid; he loved place aud power better than truth and justice, and 
he was willing to sacrifice justice and honor and everything that 
was pure that he might have position. How many there are in 
this audience who are doing the same thing! They know that 
they ought to be Christians; that they ought to receive Christ; that 
they ought to take advantage of the occasion that God has offered 
them; and yet, on account of some worldly advice of friends, or 
because some one will laugh at you, some one that may scoff and 
ridicule, you have been vacillating and halting and wavering for all 
these weeks. 

JUDGMENT UPON EVIL DOERS. 

May not the decision be made to-day? One solemn truth 
comes to me to-day, and that is, that all these men that would not 
decide for Christ and decided against Him, had punishment sent 
upon them ! There was Annas ; we are told that in the next gen- 
eration the mob of Jerusalem tore down his house and dragged his 
son through the streets and scourged and killed him. That was a 
terrible judgment. We are told that Judas went out and hung him- 
self. We find that Caiaphas, who was High Priest, and wanted to 
keep his office and position, and did not dare to decide in favor of 
Christ, lost his office the very next year. 

We are told that Herod was sent off to exile and banishment, 
and died a terrible death ; and Pilate, who was the central Governor 
of Judea, and had had the office but a little while at this time, was 
soon afterward displaced from the very office that he had tried so 
hard to keep. He went off into exile, and remorse settled down 
upon him, and we have it on pretty good authority that he com- 
mitted suicide. 

What a grave mistake he made ! How his name might have 
blazed out upon this inspired Word ! How it might have been 
handed down gloriously through the ages, with the names of Peter, . 
James, and John, with Nicodemus and Joseph ! Thoroughly con- 
vinced that he ought to be in favor of Christ, he had not the moral 
courage to stand by his conviction. Lost, lost, lost, for time and 

23 



354 DECISION. 

for eternity for want of decision ! I believe in my soul that there 
are more at this day being lost in this city for want of decision than 
for any other thing. 

O, my friends, what is your decision to-day ? What are you 
going to do with Christ ? That is the question to-day. I do not 
care much about the sermon ; if I could only get this text down 
into your heart, get it down deep into your soul, I should feel I had 
accomplished my work here. It is not preaching you want now ; 
it is to come to a decision, to decide what you will do with God's 
own Son ? He gave Him up freely for us all. Will you not receive 
Him ? It is to have Him for our Saviour now, or at some future 
day to have Him for our judge. 

TRIES TO SHIRK RESPONSIBILITY. 

Pilate, like every other sinner, wanted to get rid of the respon- 
sibility. He did not like to be pressed to a decision. He shifted 
the responsibility to Herod. But even Herod refused to take His 
life, and sent Him back ; so Pilate tries again. He thinks he has 
got a plan that will work. He puts it out of his own power — foolish 
man ! He ought to have decided "it" himself, and not left the 
multitude to decide. He said, " I will put the question to them now 
and get them to decide." Poor deluded man ! He thought they 
would choose Jesus instead of Barabbas. 

He did not know the depravity of man's heart, and how they 
were in league with hell against Christ. He took the murderer and 
highwayman, and asked them which one he should release, and the 
multitude lifted up their voice and said, " Release unto us Barab- 
bas." After they had made that decision the poor disapppointed 
Governor said to them, " What shall I do with Jesus that was called 
Christ ?" And they answered, " Let Him be crucified." 

Let us look at Barabbas. It seems to me that there is no' case 
in the whole Bible where the great doctrine of substitution is 
brought out better than in this one. There was a man condemned 
in one of our Western cities. What troubled him the most was, 
that the night he was to be executed, they were making the gallows 
in the prison. He heard them sawing the planks and driving the 



DECISION. 355 

nails ; aud as lie heard he trembled from head to foot. This cross 
might have beeen made in the prison where Barabbas was con- 
fined, and these two thieves to be crucified with Christ might have 
been associated with Barabbas, and he might have been the ring- 
leader in crime. 

"BARABBAS, YOU ARE FREE!" 

Barabbas knows he has to die, that there is no hope ; he has 
perhaps heard them making the crosses, one for him and the 
others for each of his two companions. At last the executioner 
comes. He hears the footfall in the hall, as he takes one man 
from his cell, and then another, and there is poor Barabbas trem- 
bling from head to foot. He thinks, " In a few moment I will be 
lead to execution, and will be nailed to the cross, to die its terrible 
death ;" and while Barabbas trembles, the executioner comes and 
unlocks the door, and throws it open and says, " Barabbas you are 
free ! " " What! free ? Am I free ? " " Yes, you are free." "What 
do you mean? How comes this? Who set me free?" "Pilate 
asked the people which should be free, yourself or Jesus of Naza- 
reth, and the multitude have chosen you to be released, and Christ 
is to be put to death in your stead." 

What joy, what good news it must have been for poor Barab- 
bas! And think, my friends, what guilt there was in that 
multitude making the choice of Barabbas ! I never saw any 
one in my life but thought it was one of the most cruel cases in 
this world. 

But did you ever stop to think that what you are doing is 
worse ? The man that chooses this world has chosen much worse 
than the Jews did. I would rather choose Barabbas than the god 
of this world. If you reject Jesus Christ, bear in mind that Satan 
is your god; he leads you on with an unseen hand. He is your 
tempter, and is trying to lure you away from the world of light, to 
leave you in the dark caverns of eternal death and ruin. 

Thanks be to God, there is hope to-day ; this very hour you 
can choose Him and serve Him. O, make your choice to-day. It 
is not between Jesus and Barabbas now ; it is between the Lord of 



356 DECISION. 

Glory, the Prince of Peace, or the Devil of Hell. Every one 
has to decide, whether he wants to decide or not. Some people 
say, "I do not propose to decide this question at once. I am 
going to be neutral." No one can have Christ presented to him 
but he has to decide. You will either decide to reject or to receive 
Him. There is but one alternative ; if you reject Him you will 
receive the devil. 

IT IS FOLLY TO SCOFF. 

If we would stop putting this question over from day to day 
unanswered, if that little girl sitting by her mother would just say 
what she would do, how happy we should all be. There are some 
here this afternoon who have come, perhaps, to scoff and laugh. 
Dear friends, are you going to scoff on ? Are you going to die in 
your sins and be lost ? When Jesus comes this afternoon and 
knocks at the door of your heart and wants you to become a 
Christian, are you going to reject Him ? Some say, " Well, I camt 
give up the world." Would you rather have the world than have 
Christ? Would you rather have the god of pleasure than the God 
of Heaven? 

There is no way to stand neutral on this question. You must 
have one or the other ; you must have the god of earth or the God 
of Heaven. I pity the man or woman who is living for this world. 
You will not only be disappointed now, but you will be disap- 
pointed all through this life. The god of pleasure can never lift 
you up and make your heart to rejoice. Solomon looked abroad 
over this land for that which would satisfy the yearnings of his 
soul. He picked up worldly pleasure, looked at it, and then laid it 
away and said, "Vanity, vanity, all is vanity !" There are many 
who live for wealth and social position. What is it after you have 
got it ? It is like the boy running after a bubble ; when you get 
it it is gone. 

Oh, that this text would sink deep into the hearts of all here, 
that they might be made to realize their need of Christ ! Don't 
go out of this hall and say you will forget this text. Just let it 
sink into your heart and say, "What shall I do with Jesus?" 



DECISION. 357 

Won't yon stop just a moment and think, What shall I do with 
Him ? One of two things you must do ; you must either receive 
Him or reject Him. You receive Him here, and He will receive 
you there ; you reject Him here and He will reject you there. O, 
may every soul make up its mind where it will spend eternity ! 
Whether it will be found in the world of light or in the dark cav- 
erns of eternal woe. 

ONE THING WEALTH COULD NOT BUY. 

There was a young woman dying. Her father and mother 
were wealthy. They had brought her up with every wish gratified. 
She had lived in luxury. In worldly things she had wanted noth- 
ing. Her parents bestowed upon her all that wealth could buy ; 
but at last she was taken sick, and when she came down to the 
bank of the river, she said : " Father and mother, won't you go with 
me, it is dark ? " They wept bitterly over the dying child, but they 
told her they could not go. Then she wanted them to pray for 
her, but they didn't know how to pray. The father and the mother 
stood at her bedside and sent for a minister, but it was too late. 
When he arrived she was dead. 

My friends, that dark hour will come to all of us. We must 
pass through the valley of the shadow of death, and if we have 
not Christ it will be very dark. A man became anxious for the 
spiritual welfare of a friend. He went and asked him if he would 
not come to Christ. The man was occupied in business ; he didn't 
have time to seek the Kingdom of God. Time passed on, and one 
day this kind friend heard that the man to whom he had spoken 
was sick, that he had caught cold. The friend went to the sick 
man's bedside, hoping to win the soul to Christ. He spoke to him 
about Jesus, and begged him not to delay repentance. The man 
said to the friend, " I wish you would come in to-morrow ; I don't 
feel well enough to talk now, but come in to-morrow, and I will be 
better." 

The next day he went again, and the man said, " Don't talk 
to me now ; I am not well enough yet." The next day he went 
again, but the doctor had given orders that no one should go into 



358 DECISION. 

the room where the invalid was. Then the Christian friend begged 
of the wife to let him go in, bnt the wife said the doctor had given 
orders that no one shonld see him. And I believe that many 
ungodly physicians do this just to keep Christians away from 
dying sinners. They don't believe in God, and are willing to see 
others die without a knowledge of the Saviour. 

The friend called the next day and was again told that no one 
was permitted to enter the room. The man was dead when he went 
the next day. I believe that man intended to receive Christ. There 
are many who intend to receive Christ but put it off to a more con- 
venient time. What Satan wants is for you to put it off until 
to-morrow. He knows that to-morrow never comes. 

NOW IS THE ACCEPTED TIME. 

Don't delay the answer to this great question, " What shall I 
do with Christ ?" Accept Him now. When you are sick it is no 
time to receive Jesus. When death comes He often steals in 
unawares. Some men don't know that death is coming until they 
are hurried away into the other world without any preparation. 
How much do you think some lost one would give if he had his 
life to live over again ? How much do you think Agrippa would 
give to be in Paul's place now ? How much do you think those 
men who took part in the services and heard Christ preach to them 
would give if they had the opportunity you have here this 
afternoon ? 

Oh, if I could go to the borders of the lost world, and call 
upon one soul, and bring him on this platform, and let him tell 
the awful horror and woe of being separated from Christ, how ter- 
rible it would be. Why, I believe that Caiaphas would be very 
glad to exchange places with John ; but it is too late now. All the 
opportunities are gone. They risked all for wealth and station. 
And what was the wealth and the position these men held ? It 
was only for a few months or years, and then God changed their 
countenances and sent them away. 

The rich man would have been glad to have exchanged places 
with Lazarus, who sat with the dogs at his door. What must have 



DECISION. 350 

been his misery when he saw from his terrible position Lazarus 
among the saved. It is a good deal better to be a poor beggar, 
with Christ in your heart, than to have the applause of this world 
and die without hope. 

Well, I imagine that a good many say, ' ' How am I to 
receive Christ ?" Well, my friends, you are to receive Him just as 
you are to receive anything else. You are to take Jesus just as a 
friend who gives you a gift. Why not receive Him ? You reject 
Him, and of course you must be without a gift. You must be 
without Christ. If you receive Him then He is yours for time 
and eternity. Now, I don't know any better illustration of re- 
ceiving Christ than matrimony. I see some of you smiling, but 
my friends, it is a Bible illustration. 

BRIDEGROOM AND THE TEN VIRGINS. 

Speaking of the ten virgins, He says that He was the bride- 
groom and the virgins the bride. In Revelations it is said, 
"Blessed is he who shall be at the marriage supper of the Lamb." 
You remember how a servant was sent to seek a wife for Isaac. 
He met her at the well, and as soon as he had told his errand he 
wanted to be off next morning. He wanted to take her to his 
master immediately. But they said, "Don't take her off now; let 
her remain with us a few days." But he wanted to be off, and 
they concluded to call Rebekah and see if she would accompany 
the servant. 

Then they called Rebekah and said to her, " Wilt thou go 
with this man?" She said, "Yes, I will go; I will accept of the 
invitation." It was an offer extended to her. Now, that servant 
could not say that he loved Rebekah. He had never seen her 
before, but the Lord guided him. I can tell you, my friends, that 
Jesus Christ knows all about you, and He loves you with an 
untiring love. It is just so with any lady whose hand is asked in 
marriage by a man. She can receive him or reject him, as she 
wishes. That is just the way with Christ. You can receive 
Christ — give up father, mother, home, if need be, and receive 
Christ. In marriage the man takes the first place in your heart. 



360 DECISION. 

You would not give up your home, your advantages, all your 
friends, if you did not love the person. 

So it is with Christ. You have been told about Him, read 
about Him, and I have come to-day and asked you if you would 
accept Him. I have come to-day to get a bride for my Master. I 
have come to plead Christ's cause among you. Out of these 
thousands of women are there not some who are willing to become 
Christ's people? Is there one who will go with this man? Now, 
just answer it in your own heart and say, "By the grace of God I 
will accept Jesus. This very day and this very hour I will become 
His." Now, just think a moment and answer the question, "What 
shall I do with the Jesus who is called Christ?" 

MADE A GREAT MISTAKE. 

I remember when Mr. Sankey and myself were in Chicago 
preaching. We had been five Sunday nights on the life of Christ. 
We had taken Him from the cradle, and on the fifth night we had 
just got Him up to where we have him to-day. He was in the 
hands of Pilate, and Pilate didn't know what to do with Him. I 
remember it distinctly, for I made one of the greatest mistakes 
that night I ever made. After I had nearly finished my sermon I 
said, "I want you to take this home with you, and next Sunday 
night we will see what you will do with Him." 

Well, after a while the meeting closed, and we had a second 
meeting. The people gathered in the room, and Mr. Sankey dur- 
ing the service sang a hymn, and as he got down to the verse 
"The Saviour calls, for refuge fly," I saw I had made a mistake in 
telling the people that next week they could answer. I saw that it 
was wrong to put off answering the question. After the meeting 
closed I started to go home. They were wringing the fire-alarm at 
that time, and it proved to be the death knell of our city. I didn't 
know what it meant and so went home. That night the fire raged 
through the city, destroying everything in its path, and before the 
next morning the very hall where he had gathered was in ashes. 

People rushed through the streets crazed with fear, and some 
of those who were at the meeting were burned to death. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

Man's Great Failure. 

fWANT now to call your attention to a clause in that chapter I 
have just read, a part of the 2 2d verse : " For there is no differ. 

ence" Now that is one of the verses, one of the portions of 
Scripture, that the natural man don't like. I have had many a 
quarrel with men on this verse, because we are just apt to think 
we are a iittle better than our friends and our neighbors, and men 
don't like to believe there is no difference. It is one of the greatest 
lesssons a man has to learn — that he is a sinner. If you don't 
believe that you are sick you won't call in a physician. It is just 
because the natural man don't like this text I have taken it to-night. 

I have found out long ago that the lessons we don't like are 
the best medicine for us. I can imagine there is some one here 
who says, " I don't believe that statement, that there is no differ- 
ence." I can imagine there is some one here who says, " Isn't it 
better for a man to be a sober man than it is to be a drunkard ? 
Isn't it better for a man to be honest than it is for a man to be dis- 
honest ? " Yes, we will admit all that ; but that don't apply when 
it comes to the great question of salvation. If a man has not been 
saved from sin he must perish like the rest of the world. 

Now if a man wants to find out what he is, let him turn to the 
3d chapter of Romans. He can read his life there. If you want 
to read your own biography, you need not write it yourself. Turn 
to the 3d chapter of Romans, and it is all there written by a man 
who knows a good deal more about us than we do about ourselves. 
Christ was the only one that ever trod this earth that saw everything 
in the heart of man. We read that he didn't commit himself, because 
he knew their hearts. The heart is deceitful. Who can know it? 
It is deceitful above all things, and it is desperately wicked. Now, 
Satan either tries to make men believe that they are good enough 
without salvation, or if he can't make them believe that, he tries to 

361 



362 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 

tell them that they are so bad God won't have anything to do with 
them. 

The law isn't to save men, bnt the law is brought in just to 
show man that he is lost and ruined under the law. These people 
that are trying to save themselves by the law are making the 
worst mistakes of their lives. Some people say if they try to do 
right they think that is all that is required of them. They say, "I 
try to keep the law." Well, did you ever know a man to keep the 
law except the Son of God himself ? The law was never given to 
save men by. "And what was the law then given for?" It was 
given to show man his lost and ruined condition. It was given to 
measure men by their fruit. 

PHOTOGRAPHING PEOPLE'S HEARTS. 

Before God saves a man he first stops his mouth. I meet some 
people in the inquiry- room who talk a good deal. When I meet 
those people I say to myself, " They are very far from the Kingdom 
of God." A perfect God couldn't give an imperfect standard: a 
perfect God sees that the law is pure and good ; but we are not 
good if we don't come up to the standard. Now if a man should 
come into this city and advertise that he could take a photograph 
of people's hearts and give a perfect likeness, do you think he 
would get a customer in this city ? If we go to have a photograph 
taken we brush ourselves up, and we have it taken sitting, and 
standing, and sitting in this position and sitting in that position, 
and standing in this position and standing in that position, and if 
the artist flatters us and makes us look better than we do, we send 
it around to our friends, and we say, " Yes, that is a good likeness." 
Suppose the artist could get a photograph of the heart of the true 
man, do you think he would get many customers ? A good many 
of you would say: " I wouldn't like to have the wife of my bosom 
see my heart. I wouldn't like to have her read my secret thoughts." 
The heart of man is a fountain of corruption, vileness, and pollu- 
tion, and there is no hope for a man being saved until he finds out 
he is bad. 

And so the law is a looking-glass just to show a man how foul 



MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 363 

lie is iu the sight of God. A little while before the Chicago fire I 
went home one afternoon to my family, and I thought I would take 
them out riding. My little boy, about two years old, clapped his 
hands, wanted to know if I wouldn't take him up to Lincoln Park 
to see the bears. I said that I would, and I went out. I hadn't 
been gone a great while when the little fellow wanted his mother 
to wash him up, and then he wanted to go out and play. 

SAW IT IN THE LOOKING-GLASS. 

Well, he got playing in the dirt, and he got all covered with 
dirt, and when I drove up he wanted to get into the carriage. I said, 
"No, Willie, you are not ready; I must take you in and get you 
washed." The little fellow said, "O, papa, I'se ready." I told him 
he wasn't ready, he was all over dirt. " But papa, mamma washed 
me ; I'se clean." I could not make him believe that his face was 
all dirt. He could not believe it : his mamma washed him, and he 
was clean. So I took him up and let the little fellow see himself in 
the looking-glass in the carriage. He saw the dirt and it stopped 
his mouth. I held him up to the looking-glass so that he saw the 
dirt, but I did not take the looking-glass to wash his face with. 

That is what people do. The law was not given to save man. 
It was given to show him his lost and ruined condition. It wasn't 
given to save men — the Son of God came to to that work — but the 
law is the schoolmaster that came to show us what to do when we 
are saved. Stop all this idle doing, and just come to the fountain 
that has just been opened in the house of David for sin and un- 
cleanliness. I can imagine some of you may say, "I am sure I am 
not as some people. I am not a publican. I never got drunk in 
my life. I don't like to have Mr. Moody say I am as bad as other 
people." 

I don't know but pharisaism is as bad as drunkenness, and I 
find you can just sum up the whole human race into about two 
heads — the publican and the pharisee. Yonder is an orchard, and 
in that orchard there are two apple trees — miserable, sour, bitter. 
Stop, one of them is bare ; they are worthless. Why are they good 
for nothing ? Well, one tree has got five hundred apples, and the 



364 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 

other has got five. There is no difference. The fact is the tree is 
bad. One man may have more fruit than another ; but the fruit 
is bad from the old Adam's stock. God didn't look for good fruit 
from Adam's stock. 

Make the fountain good, and the stream will be good. Make 
men's hearts good, and their lives will be good. You might as well 
tell a man to jump over the moon as to be moral, if he hasn't got 
God in his heart. The way to improve the soul of a man is to strike 
at the root of the tree, and if the heart is right and in sympathy 
with God there will be no trouble about the life. You need not be 
cultivating a crab-apple tree. That is what some people do. 

BREAKING THE LAW. 

Now, in the law it is written that a man that breaks the least 
of the law is guilty of all. Some people say, " I have not broken 
the ten commandments." They seem to think that the ten com- 
mandments are ten different laws. But a man who breaks the least 
of the commandments has broken all, and if you have broken one 
of the commandments you have broken the law of God. Some 
people think that if they only fail in one commandment they are 
not so bad ; but if a man is guilty of breaking one, he breaks all. 
And where can we find one man who does not break more than one 
commandment ? 

How many people here worship idols ! Measure your heart 
by the law of God, my friends, and you'll find yourself guilty. 
The reason why people sin so much is because they don't believe 
they do sin. Unbelief is the root of all evil. Adam sinned through 
unbelief, and we must get out of the pit at the same place he fell 
in. He fell by unbelief, and we must believe to be saved. You go 
to a prison and you will find there a good many criminals ; one is 
there for one offense and one for another, but they are all criminals. 
So here to-night, some of us are guilty of one offense and some of 
another, but we are all sinners. 

A few years ago we had a law in our city requiring all the 
policemen to be of a certain height, five feet and ten inches, I think 
it was, and of a good moral character, and to be well recommended. 



MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 365 

One day as I was going down the street with a friend, I saw a crowd 
of men standing in front of the Commissioners' office waiting to be 
examined. Now suppose my friend had gone with me into the 
Commissioners' office, and we had presented certificates of good 
moral character coming from persons high in place. 

BELOW THE STANDARD. 

When I came to present my recommendations the Commis- 
sioner would have said, " Well, Mr. Moody, before we look at your 
papers we will proceed to measure you ;" and lo, I am found to be 
but about five feet high ! So I am rejected. And my friend might 
say, "O, well, I am taller than you are, so I need have no fear on 
that score ;" but when they come to measure him he is found to be 
just one-tenth of an inch too short, and they throw him out, too. 
My father once told me that in England the archers used to shoot 
at a ring, and if the archer failed to shoot all his arrows through 
the ring he was called a sinner. Now suppose I should take ten 
arrows and try to send them through a ring at the other side of the 
building and should only get one through, I should be called a sin- 
ner. And suppose Brother Taylor should take as many arrows 
and send nine through, one after the other, and just miss the ring 
with the last one, why he would be a sinner too, just like me. 

My friends, have any of you missed the mark ? I see a man 
down there in the audience bow his head. There is hope of your 
being saved if you feel you have sinned. And who of us have not 
failed in many ways? We are all failures, and every man since 
Adam has been a failure. Many persons wish they could have 
been created perfect like Adam ; but there is no man who would 
not have fallen like Adam, if he had been put in Adam's place. 
Put iooo children into this building, and give them all sorts of 
playthings, but tell them that there is one thing in the room that 
they must not look at; leave them alone for half an hour, and they 
would all be looking at that one thing. 

Man is a stupendous failure. God on Mount Horeb shouted 
the law to man, and man said, " Oh, yes, Lord, we'll keep the law ; 
we'll not break this Thy command. And the very first command- 



366 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 

ment was, "Thou shall not have other gods." Then Moses and 
Joshua go to have an interview with God, and the people whom 
they had left behind at once begin to say, "Make us a god." And 
the golden calf was made and they worshipped it. When Moses 
and Joshua returned from Horeb they heard a great shout. Ha! 
do you hear that shout? Is it the shout of victory, of those who 
are rejoicing in conquest? No, it is the shout of the idolater. All 
worshipped the golden calf. 

BOWING DOWN TO A CALF. 

It was an idolatrous shout that the prophets heard. The wor- 
ship of the golden calf! You'll find it in this city. One man 
says, Give me more money; another, Give me a seat in Congress; 
another, Give me a bottle of rum. Ah, it's easy to condemn the 
Israelites — it is eas} 7 to smile, but beware that }~ou are not guilty 
of the same sin. Man was a failure under the judges, failure 
under the prophets, and now for 2000 years under grace he has 
been a most stupendous failure. Walk the streets and see how 
quickly he goes to ruin. How many are hastening down to the 
dark caves of sin ! Man in his best da\ 7 , under the most favorable 
circumstances, is nothing but a failure. 

Imagine Noah stopping work on the Ark, and going on a 
preaching tour. He tells the people of the Flood. He warns 
them of their danger. He exhorts them to repent. All are to 
perish, the wise, the rich, the great — all, all are to perish when God 
comes to judge. They mock at him, The} 7 tell him, "You'd 
better go back to your old Ark: do you think we will believe that 
the rich, the priests, the great, the powerful, are going to perish as 
you say?" They would mock, and would not believe. I can hear 
over the waves, that proved the warning true, this one text, "All 
have sinned and come short of the glory of God." 

Take the people of Sodom. Do you believe the} 7 would believe 
the warning voice, "No," they would say, "Sodom to be destroyed? 
Nonsence; it was never more prosperous." They would not 
believe, and didn't they all perish alike? I tell you there is no dif- 
ference when God comes. It was my sad lot to be in Chicago 



MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 367 

when that great fire swept through the city, and I have often 
thought it was almost a glimpse of the Judgment Day. All were 
on a level then. There was the house of the millionaire and near 
f it the house of the poor man. The rich man turned his back on 
his gilded palace, and the poor man went with him. There was no 
difference. 

THE GREAT WAY OF ESCAPE. 

We are all on one platform; let no mocking words escape! 
Flee for } T our lives ! Flee ! Flee ! There is a mountain we can all 
escape to — it's Calvary. You can escape thus, any night. Some 
may say I paint too dark a picture. For two nights I have tried 
to tell you of the Gospel; perhaps I have made a mistake. Christ 
kept the law. He was the Lamb, pure and spotless. He never 
broke the law, therefore He can die for the sins of man. The law 
cuts all down as a scythe cuts down the grass. All go down before 
its sweep. Right here comes in the Gospel — the Son of God came 
to seek and to save that which was lost. The grace of God brings 
grace down to men. Substitution ! If you take that out of the 
Bible, you can take the Bible along with you if you wish to. The 
same story runs all through the book. The scarlet thread is 
unbroken from Genesis to Revelation. Christ died for us, that's 
the end of the law. 

I always loved that hymn sometimes sung by Brother Sankey 
" Free from the law. O ! happy condition." He was bruised for 
us, and through Him are we saved. Napoleon Bonaparte once sent 
out a draft. A man was drafted who didn't want to go. A friend 
volunteered to go in his place. He went into the army and was 
killed. A second draft was made, and by some accident the same 
man was drafted again, but he said to the officer, " You can't take 
me, I'm dead. I died on such a battle-field." " Why, man, you 
are crazy," said the officer. " You are not dead, here you are alive 
and well before me." " No, sir," said the man, " I am dead. 

" The law has no claim on me ; look at the roll." They 
looked and found another name written against his. They in- 
sisted ; he carried his case before the Emperor, who said that he 



368 MAN'S GREAT FAILURE. 

was right, his friend had died for him. Christ died for me. The 
wages of sin is death. Christ has received this payment. It is 
the height of folly to bear this burden, when he can so easily step 
out from under it. 

A MAN WITHOUT ARMS. 

In Brooklyn, I saw a 3-oung man go b} r without any arms. 
My friend pointed him out, and told me his story. When the war 
broke out he felt it to be his duty to go to the front. He was en- 
gaged to be married, and while in the army letters passed frequently 
between him and his intended wife. After the battle of the Wil- 
derness the young lady looked anxiously for the accustomed letter. 
At last one came in a strange hand. She opened it with trembling 
fingers, and read these words : " We have fought a terrible battle. 
I have been wounded so awfully that I shall never be able to sup- 
port 3-ou more. A friend writes this for me. I love you more ten- 
derly than ever, but I release you from your promise. I will not ask 
you to join your life with the maimed life of mine." That letter 
was never answered. The next train that left the } 7 oung lad}' was 
on it. She went to his hospital. She found out the number of 
his cot and she went down the aisle, between the long rows of 
wounded men. 

At last she saw the number ; she threw her arms around his 
neck and said : " I'll not desert you. I'll take care of you." He 
did not resist her love. They were married, and there is no hap- 
pier couple than this one. You're dependent on one another. 
Christ says : " I'll take care of you. I'll take you to this bosom 
of mine." That young man could have spurned her love ; he 
could, but he didn't. Surely you can be saved if you will accept 
salvation of Him. Oh, that the grace of God may reach your 
heart to-night, by which you may be brought out from under the 
curse of the law. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

Taking God at His Word. 

HERE are times in meetings when I feel like bowing my head 
and praying. It seems as if we had preaching enough — for 
ten weeks, day after day, night after night. I am sure I 
don't know how to present Christ in any other light than I have. 
I've tried to tell you of His wonderful grace, and how full of love 
He is; and now, after I have read a few verses of Scripture, I shall 
call on some of our friends to tell you trie way of life, in hopes that 
you may get it from other lips if not from mine. Every soul here 
to-night may be saved if he will only take God at His word. Let 
me read from the 13th chapter of Acts, 39th verse. 

I do not know of any verse in the whole Bible that puts the 
way of life in clearer light than that 39th verse : " By Him all that 
believe are justified from all things from which he could not be 
justified by the law of Moses." So it is just simply to believe. 
You say, What am I to believe? You are to believe God's Word ; 
you are to take God at His word and trust Him for salvation. If 
you trust Him to keep you, He will keep you. He will save you 
the moment you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Instead of 
trying to trust Him, instead of trying to save ourselves, just drop 
the word try and put the word " trust " in. He will justify us in 
all things by just simply believing on Him. 

I do not know any word that the inquirers stumble over more 
than they do over that word believe. It is not any miraculous kind 
of belief. Some people are waiting for some belief to come down 
out of heaven. In their hearts they do not believe the}'- can have 
the same kind of faith in Him that they have in one another. It 
is not any miraculous faith or belief we want. It is to put our 
trust in God, and say with Job, " Though He slay me yet will I 
trust in Him." "I will cast myself on the mercy of God." I 
24 369 



370 TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD. 

never knew any one in my life but that got salvation who did that : 
and the very moment you do it you get salvation. 

Paul says, in the 4th chapter of Romans, 5th verse, " But to 
him that worketh not, but believe th." The very thing that keeps 
hundreds of people away from Christ is that they are trying to 
work their way to salvation. The moment you try to work for a 
gift it ceases to be a gift. If you pay even a farthing for it, it 
ceases to be a gift. Some man says he is not worthy of it, that his 
life has been so bad. What does grace mean ? It means unde- 
served favor. It is because we do not deserve it and cannot deserve 
it that God gives it to us. If a man is not going to be saved until 
he is worthy, he will never be saved. A man prayed in a prayer- 
meeting in Philadelphia the other day a prayer that made the cold 
chills run all over me. He prayed to be blessed as far as he was 
worthy. 

A REMARKABLE CONVERSION. 

We ask not because we are worthy ; we live in rebellion against 
God day after day; we have been in rebellion for years. If you 
will let rebellion cease and be willing to let the Lord save you He 
will do it. A young convert told us a week ago how he was saved. 
It was one of the sweetest conversions I ever heard of. I noticed 
him a number of times in the inquiry -room, and talked with him 
some, but I never had thought he was very deeply awakened. He 
said he was walking down Broadway one day, and just right in the 
street in one moment he was saved, by the thought that he would 
just give himself up and trust to God to save him. 

It is often said to me, " You see I do not just understand what 
it is to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ." Take that verse, " He 
came unto His own, but His own received Him not; but as many 
as received Him to them gave He power to become the daughters 
and sons of God." The difference between a saved and an unsaved 
man is that one has received Christ, and the other has not. Christ 
is the life. There is all the difference in the world between a man 
who receives Christ and a man who rejects him. Christ is God's 
gift. If you receive Him you are saved; if not, you perish. 



TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD. 3?1 

The question is whether you are willing to receive the Lord 
Jesus Christ. I know of a person who, in the city where she lived, 
at one time could hot have gone out and bought $25 worth of goods 
on credit in all the shops together ; they would not trust her. The 
next day she could have bought $1000 worth. The difference is 
that she was a poor shop girl, and she married a wealthy man. 
She had received him, and that gave her power. A person that re- 
ceives Christ has the power. A man may be poor, blind, wretched 
beggar; the next day he may have received all the treasures of 
hope; he may have espoused the Lord God. " For as many as 
received Him to them He gave everlasting life, and privilege to 
become the sons of God." If every verse but one were to be blotted 
out of the Bible, and we could choose but one, I would decide in 
one moment without hesitation. I would say give me John v. 24 : 
"Verily " — which means truly, or " Mind what I tell you." 

A WORD WITH A MEANING. 

Whenever you see " Verily, verily," in Scripture, put your 
name in right there. I put my name there ; there it is, D. L. 
Moody — " I say unto you, He that heareth my word " — I have 
heard it. Nothing can make me believe that I have not heard it — 
" He that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me" — 
I just as much believe that God sent Christ into the world, to be the 
Saviour of the world, as I believe that I exist. I could not doubt 
it. We have evidence enough ; we do not want any more. Men 
here that have been gamblers and thieves, the worst men there are, 
have been saved, who have heard His ^word. Some of you say they 
won't hold out. I know some converts of that class in Chicago 
who were saved ten years ago, who hold out faithfully yet. I know 
they said I would not hold out twenty-one years ago, but God has 
kept me so far, and I think He will continue to do so. 

" He that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent 
me " — I said to those inquirers, "Have you got it that far? Do 
you believe every word of it so far ?" " Yes." Well now the next 
w r ord — " hath, h-a-t-h, hath — everlasting life." One man said there, 
" Oh, I understand that. That is very plain." It does not say 



m% TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD. 

you shall have it when you come to die. It does not say "for six 
months, or as long as you live," but " everlasting." God says hath 
it. The next word is, "And shall not come into condemnation " — 
that means into judgment — "but has passed from death unto life." 
Paul says, " Give a reason for the faith which is within you." 

THE ROCK IS FIRM. 

If I were called upon to give a reason, I would say my reason 
is John v. 24. I took my stand on that rock twenty years ago, and 
I stand upon it yet. As the Irishman said, " I tremble sometimes, 
but the rock never does." God's Word does not fail. If you build 
your hopes of heaven on God's Word, you will be saved. Why not 
take that verse home to you, and take salvation with it ? Eternal 
life is hidden in that short verse. It is there, if you will but reach 
out your hand and take it. To-night God offers Christ to you. He 
will receive you to-night if you will take Him at His word, and 
make room for Christ in your heart to-night. 

A building in Dublin caught fire some time ago, and in it was 
a person exposed to death. The flames had already enveloped the 
staircase, but the firemen took ladders and spliced them and put 
the long ladder up, and the only hope for that person was to get 
out on the latter, but they found it was not quite long enough, and 
this person perished in the flames. Thank God, the ladder is long 
enough to-night. The fire-escape comes up to the very window 
window where you are. The question is, Will you trust the fire- 
escape — will you trust Christ to-night ? 

The other Sunday, when I was speaking on "Trust," a person 
came to me the next day and said, " I want to tell you how I was 
saved. You remember you told about that lady who sought Christ 
three years and could not find Him, and when you told that it was 
I. I was in that same condition and through your story I got 
light." I don't think I have ever told it but what somebody got 
light and life. I will tell it again, for I would go up and down the 
world telling it if I could get a convert. 

One night I was preaching, and happening to cast my eyes 
down during the sermon, I saw two eyes just riveted upon me. 



TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD. 373 

Every word that fell from my lips she just seemed to catch at with 
her own lips, and I was very anxious to go down to where she was. 
After the sermon I went to the pew and said, u My friend, are you 
a Christian ? " " Oh, no," said she, " I wish I was. I have been 
seeking Christ three years and cannot find Him." Said I, " Oh, 
there is a great mistake about that." Says she, " Do you think I 
am not in earnest ? Do you think, sir, I have not been seeking 
Christ?" 

IT IS ONLY TO BELIEVE. 

Said I, " I suppose you think you have, but Christ has been 
seeking you these twenty years, and it would not take an anxious 
sinner and an anxious Saviour three years to meet, and if you had 
been really seeking Him you would have found him long before 
this." " What would you do, then ?" Said I, " Do nothing, only 
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." " Oh," 
said she, " I have heard that till my head swims. Everybody says, 
Believe ! believe ! believe ! and I am none the wiser. I don't know 
what you mean by it." 

" Very well," said I, " I will drop the word ; but just trust the 
Lord Jesus Christ to save." " If I say I trust Him will He save me?" 
" No, you may do a thousand things ; but if you really trust Him 
He will save you." " Well," said she, " I trust Him, but I don't feel 
any different." " Ah," said I, " I have found your difficulty. You 
have been hunting for feeling all these three years. You have not 
been looking for Christ." Says she, " Christians tell how much 
joy they have got." 

" But," said I, " you want Christiau experience before you get 
one. Instead of trusting God, you are looking for Christian expe- 
rience." Then I said : " Right here in this pew, just commit your- 
self to the Lord Jesus Christ, and trust Him, and you will be 
saved," and I held her right to that word " trust," which is the 
same as the word " believe" in the Old Testament. " You know 
what it is to trust a friend. Cannot you trust God as a friend ? " 
She looked at me for five minutes, it seemed, and then said : " Mr. 
Moody, I trust the Lord Jesus Christ this night to save my soul." 



374 TAKING GOD AT HIS WORD. 

Turning to the pastor of the church she took him by the hand 
and repeated the declaration. Turning to an elder in the church 
she said again the solemn words, and near the door, meeting 
another officer of the church, she repeated for the fourth time, " I 
am trusting Jesus," and went off home. The next night when I 
was preaching I saw her right in front of me, " Eternity" written 
in her eyes, her face lightened up, and when I asked inquirers to 
go into the other room, she was first to go in. I wondered at it, for 
I could see by her face that she was in the joy of her Lord. But 
when I got in I found her with her arms around a young lady's 
aeck, and I heard her say, "It is only just trusting. I stumbled 
over it three years and found it all in trusting ; " and the three 
weeks I was there she led more souls to Christ than anybody 
there. If I got a difficult case I would send it to her. 

SUPREME ACT OF TRUST. 

Oh, my friends, to-night won't you trust Him ? Let us put 
our trust in Him. Let us commit everything to Him. Who will 
trust Him to-night ? Who will commit themselves to Him to- 
night ? Who will do it this last night we are to preach the Gos- 
pel ? Who will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ to be saved ? I 
must confess that I hate to close this meeting. 

These have been ten very sweet weeks to me ; ten precious 
weeks ; but there is one sad thought about it all, that there are a 
few who have been here night after night having missed hardly a 
night. I have looked for their coming. I have watched them, I 
have gone to their houses — some of them — and talked with them. 
I have not had time to go to many. I have gone down into the con- 
gregations and spoken to them, and they have just wavered and 
halted, and it seems as if I could not have these meetings close 
and leave them out. It seems like a visitation of God, and if these 
will not accept Him now I fear they never will. May every man 
and woman in this assemblage trust the Lord, 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

The Two Adams. 

<T WANT to speak to-day upon the subject of the two Adams. 

X Every person in this hall to-day is either in the first or second 
Adam, and I want for a little while just to draw the contrast 
between the two Adams. In the ist chapter of Genesis, 26th 
verse, we will find the Lord made the first Adam lord over every- 
thing, over creation. They have now in the old country a great 
many titled men, and a good many whom they call lords. You 
might say that Adam was the first lord ; he was the first man that 
was lord over creation. God had made him lord, or you might say 
king, and the whole world was his kingdom. He was the father 
of all. 

The second Adam you will find if you turn to the first of 
Mark. You will see that when Christ commenced his ministry, 
after He had been baptized by John, He went off into the wilder- 
ness, and there He was among the wild beasts for forty days. He 
was not made lord over everything. He came not as the first Adam 
did, but He that was rich became poor for our sakes. Then in the 
2d chapter of Genesis, the 17th verse, you will find the first Adam 
introduces sin into the world. I used to stumble over that verse 
more than any other verse in the whole Bible. I could not under- 
stand how God said Adam should die the day he ate that fruit, and 
yet he lived a thousand years. 

I didn't understand then, as I do now, that the life of the 
body is not anything in comparison with the death of the soul. 
Adam died in his soul right there and then. Death is just being 
banished from God's sight ; for God is the author of life, and the 
moment the communication was cut off between Adam and God 
that was the end of life. It was then " Eat and die." Thank 
God ! It is now eat and live. If we eat of the bread of heaven 

we shall live forever, 

375 



376 THE TWO ADAMS. 

Then in the 3d chapter of the 6th verse God told him not to 
do it, and when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, 
and that it was pleasant to the eye, and a tree to be desired to make 
one wise, she took of the frnit thereof and did eat, and gave also 
unto her husband with her, and he did eat. Now, there is the first 
sin that came into the world. 

THE FIRST AND SECOND ADAM. 

The second Man, instead of yielding to sin — He that knew no 
sin — became sin for us. The first man brought sin upon us and 
brought sin into the world, but the second Man, who was without 
sin, became sin for us. A great many complain because Adam's 
sin comes down upon the human race all these six thousand years. 
They seem to think it is unjust in God that Adam's sin should be 
visited upon the whole human race, but they forget that the very 
day Adam fell God gave us a Saviour and a way of escape, so that 
instead of complaining about God being unjust, it seems to me 
every one of us ought to look on the other side and see what a 
God of grace and love we have. 

God was under no obligations to do that. If it had been any 
one of us, we would have come down and pulled the rebel from the 
face of the earth. We would have created another man, it might 
have been, but God made a way for Adam and all his posterity to 
be saved. He gave us another man from heaven, and through 
Him all of us could be saved just by accepting life. Through the 
disobedience of one many were made sinners, but thank God, 
through the obedience of another many are made heirs of eternal 
life. I want every one in this hall to just turn away from this first 
Adam. He has brought all the misery into this world. It came 
by Adam's disobedience and transgression. He disobeyed, and sin 
came, and death came by sin. 

God's word must be kept, but you turn to the nth chapter of 
John, and you find Christ is the Resurrection and the Life. One 
brought death, and the other brought immortality to light. If it 
were not for Christ we could know nothing about resurrection. I 
pity the poor man who ignores Christ, who rejects the Son of God, 



THE TWO ADAMS. 377 

What lias he got to do at the resurrection? In the 3d chapter of 
Genesis the first Adam lost life. In the 1st chapter of John the 
second Adam gives it back to us if we will only take it. The gift 
of God is eternal life and all we have to do is to just take it. 

All the pain and sickness in this world came by the first 
Adam, but thank God the second Adam came to bear away our 
griefs and sorrows. " Surely, He hath borne our griefs and carried 
our sorrows." And you will find in the 17th chapter of Matthew 
that he cures our sickness. Now, when the first Adam had done 
this, had sinned and brought death upon the world, had brought a 
curse upon it, he ran away and hid in the bushes ; but when the 
second Adam came to take his place and suffer his guilt, instead of 
hiding away in the bushes of Gethsemane, He came out and said 
to these men who were seeking for Him, "Whom seek ye?" and 
they said, "Jesus of Nazareth;" and He answered, "Here am I." 
He delivered Himself up. 

OBEDIENT EVEN TO DEATH. 

The first man was disobedient unto death, but the second man 
was obedient unto death. Through the obedience of one, many 
shall be made alive, many shall live forever. Turn back to 
Corinthians, 15th chapter, 45th verse. That is the most wonderful 
chapter, almost, in the whole Word of God. You ought to be well 
acquainted with the 15th chapter. And so it is written, "The first 
man Adam was made a living soul, the last was made a quickening 
spirit." Now there is a difference between a living soul and a 
quickening spirit. The first was made a living soul, but he could 
not impart life to a dead body. He could hand life down through 
his own family and his own line. He was made a living soul, and 
he could have lived forever if he had not sinned; but the second 
Adam was made a quickening spirit; therefore He could raise 
others from the dead. 

All He had to do was to speak to a dead body and it would 
live. That is the difference between the first Adam and the second. 
The first was made a living soul and he lost life, and the second 
was made a quickening spirit, and all He had to do was to speak to 



378 THE TWO ADAMS. 

dead bodies and they lived. He was the conquerer over death; He 
bound death hand and foot and overcame it and was a quickening 
spirit. 

Now the first Adam was of earth, earthy. God promised him 
the earth; God gave him Eden, and he was all of this earth, earthy. 
The second man is the Lord from heaven. That is the difference 
between the two Adams. One is all of earth, earthy, and the 
other is from heaven. Now I don't see what people are going to 
do with these passages in the Bible where they try to ignore 
Christ's godhead, saying that He did not belong to the godhead — 
that He was not God-man. "The second man was from heaven," 
says Paul, "and therefore He spoke as a man from heaven." 

THE TEMPTER OVERCOME. 

When the first Adam was tempted he yielded to the first 
temptation. When the second Adam was tempted He resisted. 
Satan gave Him a trial. God won't have a Son that He cannot try. 
He was tried; He was tempted; He took upon Him your nature 
and mine and withstood the temptation. The first Adam was 
tempted by his bride. The second was tempted for His bride. God 
says, "I will give you the church." He was tempted in this world 
just for His bride — the church. He came for His bride, and 
instead of the bride tempting Him, He overcame all that He might 
win the bride to Himself. 

And you can always tell the difference between the two Adams. 
When the first Adam sins he begins to make an excuse. Man 
must have an excuse always ready for his sins. When God came 
down and said, "Adam, where art thou ? What have you been 
doing? Have you been eating of that tree?" he hung his head 
and had to own up that he had ; but he said, " Lord, it is the 
woman that tempted me." He had to charge it back upon God, 
you see. 

Instead of putting the blame where it belonged, on his own 
shoulders, he tried to blame God for his sins. That is what the 
first Adam was. We have it right here every day in our inquiry- 
room — men trying to charge the sin back on God instead of getting 



THE TWO ADAMS. 379 

up and confessing their sins. They say, "Why did God tempt 
me? Why did God do this and that?" That was the spirit of 
the first Adam. But, thank God, the second Adam made no excuse. 
He took it upon Himself to bear our sins upon the tree. 

The first Adam looked upon the tree and plucked its fruit 
and Jell. The second Adam was nailed to the tree. " Cursed is 
^every one that is nailed to the tree." He became a curse for us. 
The two wonderful events that have taken place in the world are 
these, that when the first Adam went up from Eden he left a curse 
upon the earth, but when the second Adam went up from the 
Mount of Olives He lifted the curse. The first brought the curse 
upon the earth, the second as He went up from the Mount of Olives 
lifted the curse, and so every man that is in Christ can shout Vic- 
tory ! and there is no victory until he is in Christ. 

THE GLORY OF DEATH. 

When God turned Adam out of Eden, He put cherubim at 
the gate with a sword ; Adam could not go back to the tree of life. 
It would have been a terrible thing if he had gone back and eaten 
the fruit, and had never died. O, my friends, it is a good thing to 
be able to die, that in the evening of life we may shuffle off this 
old Adam coil, and be with the Son of God. There is nothing sad 
about death to a man that is in Christ Jesus. God put a sword 
there to guard the tree of life. The Son of Man went into the 
garden and plucked up the tree, and transferred it into Paradise. 

The gates are ajar (that is a poetical expression, but I use it 
for an illustration), and all we have to do is to walk right in and 
pluck the fruit and eat. Men complain because Adam was driven 
out of the Garden of Eden. I would rather be up there, where 
Satan cannot go, than to be in the old Eden. 

Thanks be to God, Satan cannot go up there ! The tree is 
planted by the throne of God, and there is the crystal stream by 
the river, and the tree is planted beside it. If God put Adam out 
of this earthly Eden on account of one sin, do you think He will 
let us into the Paradise above with our tens of thousands of sins 
upon us ? If He punished one sin in that way, and would not 



380 THE TWO ADAMS. 

allow him to live in the old garden for one sinner, will He permit 
us to go to heaven, with all our many sins upon us ? There is no 
sense in the sacred history of the atonement unless our sins have 
been transferred to another and put away. 

There is no hope unless God's sword has been raised against 
sin, and if God finds sin on you and me we must die. All we have 
to do is to turn our sins over to Him who has borne our sins in 
His own body on the tree. Will you turn to the 3d chapter of 
Colossians, 3d verse : " For ye are dead, and your life is hid with 
Christ in God." When Adam was driven out of Eden, all he lost 
was an earthly garden. God never promised him heaven. He 
was not a fallen man ; he was an earthly man. God gave him 
Eden. What do we get if we are of the second Adam ? 

THE GREAT DESPOILER DEFEATED. 

The moment that God pronounced His Creation good, then 
evil began to creep in. You could hear the footsteps of Satan 
coming. Satan said to himself, " Good, is it? I will mar it then;" 
and he went to work to destroy God's work. But no sooner had 
Satan left Eden than God came right down and put man into a 
higher place than before. Thanks be to Him, we have our life hid 
with Christ in God ! You know Satan was once the Son of the 
Morning, but God afterward cast him out, and now God takes a 
man and puts him in Satan's former place beside Him on the 
throne. We have more in the second Adam than we lost in the 
first Adam. 

There is a poor sinner that takes and hides his life in Christ ; 
how will Satan get at him ? He is secure. Our life is where 
Satan cannot get at it. If he could he would get at it before we 
could have time to get our dinners to-day, and we could not 
have the power ourselves to keep him out ; but Christ keeps 
him out, and we are secure. When God said to old Adam, 
" Where art thou ?" Adam went and hid away. When he asked 
the second Adam, " Where art thou?" He was at the right hand 
of God. When God asked the first Adam, "What hast thou 
done?" he said he had sinned. The second Adam said, " I have 



THE TWO ADAMS. 381 

glorified thee forever." He came for that purpose. That is all 
that He did when He was down here on earth. 

I want to call your attention to the natures of the two men. 
It is one of the most important truths that can be brought out I 
was a Christian for twelve or fifteen years before I understood the 
two natures. I had a good deal of doubt and uncertainty because 
I did not understand one thing. I thought when a man was con- 
verted God changed his whole nature. We very often talk about 
a change of heart. I do not think that is a good way to put it. 
You cannot find those words in Scripture. All through Scripture 
it is a "new birth;" it is a new creation; it is new life given; 
" born from above of the Spirit ; " " born again." If it is a new birth 
it must be a new nature. 

TWO NATURES IN ONE MAN. 

I believe that every child of God has two natures. Some 
people say, " Why have you Christians so much conflict ? You 
are always struggling with yourselves, and having conflict. We 
don't have it. Why is it?" Because we have two natures; and 
there is a battle always going on between the worlds of light and 
darkness. Once there was a judge who had a colored man. 

The colored man was very godly, and the judge used to have 
him to drive him around in his circuit. The judge used often to 
talk with him, and the colored man would tell the judge about his 
religious experience and about his battles and conflicts. One day 
the judge said to him, u Sambo, how is it that you Christians are 
always talking about the conflicts you have with Satan. I am 
better off than you are. I don't have any conflicts or trouble, and 
yet I am an infidel." That floored the colored man for a while. 
He didn't know how to meet the old infidel's argument. The 
judge always carried a gun along with him for hunting. Pretty 
soon they came to a lot of ducks. The judge took his gun and 
blazed away at them, and wounded one and killed another. The 
judge said quickly, u You jump in and get the wounded duck," 
and did not pay any attention to the dead one until the wounded 
one was safely secured. 



382 THE TWO ADAMS. 

The colored man then thought he had his illustration. He 
said to the judge, " I think I can explain to you now how it is that 
Christians have more conflict than infidels. Don't you know that 
the moment you wounded that duck, how anxious you was to get 
him out, and that you didn't care anything about the dead duck until 
after you had saved the other one?" " Yes," said the judge. "Well, 
I am a wounded duck ; and I am all the time trying to get away 
from the devil ; but you are a dead duck, and he has you anyhow, 
and does not bother about you until he gets me for certain." 

THE OLD ADAM AND THE NEW. 

So the devil has no conflict. He can devour the helpless and 
the widow, and it does not trouble him ; he can drive a sharp bar- 
gain, and get the advantage of a man and ruin him, and not be 
troubled about it ; and he can heap up such things all the time, 
and have no conflict within. Why ? Because the new nature in 
him is not begun. When a man is born of God he gets a new 
life. One is from heaven and comes from Christ, that heavenly 
manna that comes from the throne of God. The other is of the 
earth, and comes of the old Adam. When I was born of my father 
and mother I received their nature; when they were born of their 
parents they received their nature; and you can trace it back to 
Eden. We then received God's nature. 

There are two natures in man that are distinct as day and 
night. With that old Adam in us, if we do not keep him down in 
the place of death, he brings us into captivity. I do not see how 
any one can explain the 6th, 7th, and 8th chapters of Romans in 
any other way. People sometimes tell me they have got out of the 
7th chapter of Romans, but I notice they always get back there 
again. The fact is, we do not know ourselves. 

It takes us all our lives to find out who and what we are, and 
when we think we know something happens that makes us think 
we are not much further than we were when we started. The 
heart is deceitful above all things. In the 6th chapter of Romans 
it is written : ' ' Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him 
that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should 



THE TWO ADAMS. 383 

not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin." And in the 
nth verse there are jnst three words to be specially considered: 
" Reckon yourselves dead." 

If we were really dead, we would not have to reckon ourselves 
dead; but if we were dead, as it means there, we have to think of 
it and "reckon" about it. Judicially we are dead, but in reality we 
are down here fighting the world, the flesh, and the devil. Some 
people seem to think they have got away from the flesh, and that 
they are soaring away in a sort of seventh heaven, but they get 
back again sooner or later. We find them wandering off down 
here. You cannot make the flesh anything but flesh. It will be 
flesh all the time ; it will bring us into captivity. If we do not put 
it off and crucify it, and keep it in the place of death, it will keep 
us there for ever. 

NO EXCUSE FOR WRONGDOING. 

What if a man does yield and says it is not he, but it is the 
sin in him? It is but one man after all, not two men; and one man 
is responsible. If I am led astray by Satan, I may protest against 
it as much as my accuser does. I say I know I have been wrong; 
I was off guard; I was not watching; but I hate it as much as any 
one does. That is the reason why in the 7th chapter of Romans 
he calls it "I protest." But protestation does not excuse us. 

A man went into court, having been arrested for something. 
He said he did not do it, and when it was proved against him he 
said he did not do it — it was the old man in him. The Judge said: 
"Well, I will send the old man to prison: the other may do what 
he can." If we yield and sin we have to suffer. 

And at the very time that we are doing good Satan comes 
along and says, "That is a good action," and goes on and gets us 
all puffed up. There are a good many that have been ruined by 
spiritual pride. At the very time we are trying to do good the 
devil is present trying to get us to do it with some impure motive. 
We are to put him off. He is no longer our master. We have 
been redeemed, and we belong to the new man. We must starve 
out the old man; give him no food at all; not let him speak. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Christian Love. 

fT speaks in Galatians about love, the fruit of the Spirit being 
love, joy, peace, gentleness, long suffering, meekness and 

temperance. The way this writer has put it — and I think it is 
very beautiful — is that joy is love exultant, peace is love in repose, 
and long suffering is love enduring. It is all love, you see, a gen- 
tleness is love in society, and goodness is love in action, and faith 
is love on the battle-field, and meekness is love at school, and tem- 
perance is love in training. 

Now there are a great many that have got love and they hold 
the truth. I should have said they have got truth, but they don't 
hold it in love, and they are very unsuccessful in working for God. 
They are very harsh, and God cannot use them. Now let us hold 
the truth, but let us hold it in love. People will stand almost any 
kind of plain talk if you only do it in love. If you do it in harsh- 
ness it bounds back and they won't receive it. So what we want is 
to have the truth and at the same time hold it in love. 

Then there is another class of people in the world that have 
got the truth, but they love so much that they give up the truth 
because they are afraid it will hurt some one's feelings. That is 
wrong. We want the whole truth anyway. We don't want to give 
it up, but hold it in love, and I believe one reason why people think 
God don't love them is because they have not this love. I met a 
lady in the inquiry-room to-day, and I could not convince her that 
God loved her, for she said that if He did love her He would not 
treat her as He had. And I believe people are all measuring God 
with their own rule, as I said the other day, and we are not sincere 
in our love, and we very often profess something we really don't 
possess. Very often we profess to have love for a person when we 
do not, and we think God is like us. 

Now God is just what He says He is, and He wants His chil- 
384 



CHRISTIAN LOVE. 385 

dren to be sincere in love ; not to love just merely in word and in 
tongue, but to love in earnest. That is what God does. You ask 
me why God loves. You might as well ask me why the sun shines. 
It can't help shining, and neither can He help loving, because He 
is love Himself, and any one that says He is not love does not know 
anything about love. If we have got the true love of God shed 
abroad in our hearts we will show it in our lives. We will not have 
to go up and down the earth proclaiming it. We will show it in 
everything we say or do. 

VERY NICE TO THEIR FACES. 

There is a good deal of what you might call sham love. 
People profess to love you very much, when you find it is all on 
the surface. It is not heart love. Very often you are in a person's 
house, and the servant comes in and says such a person is in the 
front room, and she says: "Oh, dear, I am so sorry he has come, 
I can't bear the sight of him ;" and she'll get right up and go into 
the other room and say, " Why, how do you do ? I am very glad to 
see you! " [Laughter.] There is a good deal of that sort of thing 
in the world. 

I remember, too, I was talking with a man one day and an 
acquaintance of his came in, and he jumped up at once and shook 
him by the hand — why I thought he was going to shake his hand 
out of joint, he shook so hard — and he seemed to be so glad to see 
him and wanted him to stay, but the man was in a great hurry and 
could not stay, and he coaxed him and urged him to stay, but the 
man said no, he would come another time ; and after that man went 
out my companion turned to me and said, " Well, he is an awful 
bore, and I am glad he's gone." Well, I began to feel that I was a 
bore, too, and I g&t out as quickly as I could. [Laughter.] That 
is not real love. That is love with the tongue while the heart is 
not true. Now, let us not love in word and in tongue, but in deed 
and in truth. That is the kind of love God gives us, and He wants 
the same in return. 

Now, there is another side to this truth. A man was talking 
to me out here the other day that he didn't believe there was 

25 



386 CHRISTIAN LOVE. 

any love at all ; that Christians professed to have love, but he 
didn't believe men could have two coats, and I think he reflected 
on me, because I had on my overcoat at the time and he hadn't got 
any. I looked at him and said : " Suppose I should give you one 
of my coats, you would drink it up before sundown. I love you too 
much to give you my coat and have you drink it up." 

A good many people are complaining now that Christians don't 
have the love they ought to have, but I tell you it is no sign of 
want of love that we don't love the lazy man. I have no sympathy 
with those men that are just begging twelve months of the year. 
It would be a good thing, I believe, to have them die off. They 
are of no good. I admit there are some that are not real, and sin- 
cere, and true, but there are many that would give the last penny 
they had to help a man who really needed help. But there are a 
good many sham cases — men that won't work, and the moment 
they get a penny they spend it for drink. To such men it is no 
charity to give. A man that won't work should be made to work. 
I believe there is a great deal more hope of a drunkard or a murderer 
or a gambler than there is of a lazy man. 

TOO LAZY TO STAY CONVERTED. 

I never heard of a lazy man being converted yet, though I re- 
member talking once with a minister in the backwoods of Iowa 
about lazy men. He was all discouraged in his efforts to convert 
lazy men, and I said to him, " Did you ever know a lazy man to be 
converted ?" " Yes," said he ; "I knew of one, but he was so lazy 
that he didn't stay converted but about six weeks." And that is 
as near as I ever heard of a lazy man being converted , and if there 
are any here to-day saying they don't love us because we don't 
give them any money, I say we love them too well. We don't give 
to them because it is ruin. 

Some years ago I picked up several children in Chicago and 
thought I would clothe them and feed them, and I took special 
interest in those boys to see what I could make of them. I don't 
think it was thirty days before the clothes had all gone to whisky 
and the fathers had drank it all up. One day I met one of the 



CHRISTIAN LOVE. 387 

little boys for whom I bought a pair of boots only the day before. 
There was a snow-storm coming up and he was barefooted. " Mike," 
says I, u how's this ? Where are your boots ?" " Father and mother 
took them away," said he. There is a good deal that we think is 
charity that is really doing a great deal of mischief; and the people 
must not think because we don't give them money to aid them in 
their poverty that we don't love them, for the money would go into 
their pockets to get whisky with. 

POVERTY SOMETIMES A BLESSING. 

It is no sign that we are all hypocrites and insincere in our 
love that we don't give money. I believe if the prodigal son could 
have got all the money he wanted in that foreign country he would 
never have come home, and it was a good thing for him that he 
did get hard up and to live on the husks that the swine ate. And 
it is a good think that people should suffer. If they get a good 
living without work, they will never work. We can never make 
anything of them. God has decreed that man shall earn his bread 
by the sweat of his brow, and not live on other people. 

But I am getting away from the subject. I only wanted to 
touch upon this subj ect because a good many are complaining that 
Christian people don't help them. I have sometimes fifteen or 
twenty letters a day, coming from Kansas, and Europe even, asking 
us to take up a collection. They say : " Here is a poor woman. Just 
get the people to give a penny apiece." Suppose we began doing 
that sort of thing. We should have to have somebody to look up 
this man or this woman and find if they are worthy. If we took 
up one collection, we would have to take up five hundred. I never 
found a person true to Christ but what the Lord would take care of 
them. I think it is a good thing for people to suffer a little until 
they come back to God. They will find that God will take care of 
them that love Him. A great many say, "Oh, I love God." It is 
easy enough to say this, but if you do love God He knows about it, 
be assured. He knows how much you love Him. You may 
deceive your neighbors, and think you love God, and assume a 
good deal of love, when there is really no love in your heart. 



388 CHRISTIAN LOVE. 

Now it says in Corinthians viii. 3: "But if any man love 
God, the same is known of him." God is looking from heaven 
down into this world just to find that one man. God knows where 
he lives, the number of his house, and the name of the street he 
lives in. In fact, He has the very hairs of your head numbered, 
and He will take good care of you. He will not let any of His own 
children come to want, He will not let any of those that come to 
want suffer, He will provide for their wants if they are only sincere, 
but He don't want any sham work, When the Lord was here He 
was all the time stripping those Pharisees of their miserable self- 
righteousness. They professed great love for Him while their 
hearts were far from God. Let us not profess to love God with our 
tongue and lips, while our lives are far from it. 

DON'T KNOW THEIR OWN MINDS. 

Another class say, "I don't know whether I love God or not. 
I am really anxious to know whether or not I love God." Now, if 
you are really anxious it won't take you long to find out. You 
cannot love God and the world at the same time, because they 
abhor each other. They are at enmity, always have been and 
always will be. It is the world that crucified God's Son; it 
was the world that put God's Son to death. Therefore, if we 
love the world it is a pretty good evidence that the love of the 
Father is not in us. We may say our prayers and go through 
some religious performances, but our hearts are not right with 
God because we cannot love God and the world at the same 
time. We have got to get the world under our feet and the love of 
God must be first in our hearts or else we have not got the love 
of God. 

The command we have is that he who loveth God loveth his 
brother also. Now, if we have got our heart full of enmity and 
jealousy and malice toward any of God's children it is a sure sign 
that the love of God is not in our hearts. To love a man that loves 
me — that don't require any goodness; the greatest infidel can do 
that; but to love a man that reviles me and lies about me and slan- 
ders me — that takes the grace of God. I may not associate with 



CHRISTIAN LOVE. 389 

him, but I may love him. I may hate the sin, but love the sinner. 
And that is one of the tests by which to find out whether you have 
love in your heart. The first impulse of the young convert is to 
love every one, and to do all the good he can, and that is the sign 
that a man has been born from above, born of God, and that he has 
got real love in his heart ; and these tests God gives us that we may 
know. 

CHRISTIAN LOVE OPPOSED TO WORLDLINESS. 

The question is, do you love the world? Had you rather go 
to a theatre than to prayer-meeting? Had you rather go to a dance 
than to commune with the godly? If so it is, then it is a good sign 
that you have not been converted and not born of God. That is a 
test. People want to know whether they love God or not ; let them 
turn to that test and they will find out. If your heart is set on 
the world and you had rather not be with God's people, it is a sure 
sign that you have not been born of God. 

Well, there is another class of people who say, "I don't see 
if God really loves me and I love Him, why I am called upon to 
have so many afflictions and troubles." Just turn a moment to the 
8th chapter of Romans, the 28th verse : " And we know that all 
things work together for good to them that love God, to them that 
are called according to His purpose." It is not a few things, not 
a part of them, but all work together for good. Give a man con- 
stant prosperity and how quickly he turns away from God, and so 
it is a little trouble here, and a little reverse here, and some pros- 
perity there, and taken all together it is the very thing we need. 

If you just take your Bibles you will find that God loves you. 
There is no one in this wide world, sinner, that loves you as God 
loves you. You may think your father loves you, or your mother 
loves you, or a brother or a sister, but let me tell you you can mul- 
tiply it by ten thousand times ten thousand before it can equal 
God's love. " While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Can 
you have greater proof of God's love and Christ's love ? " Greater 
love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his 
friends." Christ laid down his life for his enemies. Ah, my friends, 



390 CHRISTIAN LOVE. 

it will take all eternity for us to find out the height and breadth 
and length and depth of God's love. 

I am told that when the Roman Catholic Archbishop in Paris 
was thrust into prison during the last war there w r as a window in 
the door of his cell in the shape of a cross. He took his pencil 
and at the top and bottom marked the height and length and depth, 
and at each end of the arm the length and breath. Ah, that Catholic 
bishop had been to Calvary. He could realize the breadth and 
length and depth and height of God's love, and that Christ gave 
Himself up freely for us all. 

PROTECTED BY THE FLAG. 

How men with an open Bible can say that God don't love them 
is more than I can understand. But the devil is deceitful and puts 
that into their heads. Let me beg you, beg you, go to Calvary and 
there you may just for a moment catch a glimpse of God's love. 
There was a man came from Europe to this country a year or two 
ago, and he became dissatisfied and went to Cuba in 1867 when 
they had a great civil war there. Finally he was arrested for a 
spy, court-martialed, and condemned to be shot. He sent for the 
American Consul and the English Consul, and went on to prove 
to them that he was no spy. These two men were thoroughly con- 
vinced that the man was no spy, and they went to one of the Spanish 
officers and said, ' ' This man you have condemned to be shot is an 
innocent man." " Well," the Spanish officer says, " the man has 
been legally tried by our laws and condemned, and the law must 
take its course and the man must die." 

And the next morning the man was led out ; the grave was 
already dug for him, and the black cap was put on him, and the 
soldiers were there ready to receive the order, "Fire," and in a few 
moments the man would be shot and be put in that grave and 
covered up, when who should rise up but the American Consul, 
who took the American flag and wrapped it around him, and the 
English Consul took the English flag and wrapped it around him, 
and they said to those soldiers, " Fire on those flags if you dare ! " 
Not a man dared ; there were two great governments behind those 



CHRISTIAN LOVE. 391 

flags. And so God says, " Come under my banner, come under 
the banner of love, come under the banner of heaven." God will 
take good care of all that come under His banner. 

Oh, my friends, come under the banner of heaven to-day. 
This banner is a banner of love. May it float over every soul here, 
is the prayer of my heart. God don't will the death of any who 
will come under His banner of love. It is pure love, and sinner, 
may the love of God bring you into the fold is the prayer of my 
heart. I read once of a young man who left his father, and at last 
that father died and the boy came to the funeral, and there was not 
a tear that flowed over his cheeks during all the funeral. He saw 
that father laid down into the grave, and he did not shed a tear. 
When they came to break the will, and the boy heard that the 
father had dealt kindly with him and had given him some property, 
he began to shed tears. When that boy heard his father's will 
read, his heart was broken, and he came to his father's God. 

O sinner, if you want to find out God's love, take this last will 
and testament of Jesus Christ. He showed his love by going to 
Calvary ; He showed his love by His death agony there. He loves 
you with an everlasting love ; He don't want you to perish. O, may 
you love Him in return. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

Abounding Grace. 

T AM going to take to-night a subject rather than a text. I want 
X to talk to you about free grace. I say free grace; perhaps I 
had better drop the word "free" and say just "grace." There 
is a sermon just in the meaning of the word. It is one of those 
words that are very little understood at the present time, like the 
work gospel. There are a great many that are partakers of the 
spirit of Christ or of grace that don't know its meaning. I think 
it is a good idea to go to Webster's dictionary and look up the 
meaning of these words that we hear so often but don't fully 
understand. 

You seldom go into a religious assembly but you hear the 
word grace, and yet I was a partaker of the grace of God for years 
before I knew what it meant. I could not tell the difference 
between grace and law. Now grace means unlimited mercy r 
undeserved favor, or unmerited love. I had a man come to-day to 
see me, and his plea was that he was not fit to be saved. He said 
there was no hope for him because he had sinned all his life and 
there was nothing good in him. I was was very much gratified to 
hear him say that. There is hope for that man — and I suppose he 
is here to-night — and there is hope for any man who thinks there 
is nothing good in him. That was the lesson Christ tried co teach 
the Jews — the lesson of grace. But they were trying to prove 
themselves to be better than other people. They were of the scqcL 
of Abraham and under the Mosaic law, and better than the people 
about them. 

Now let us get at the source of this stream, that has been 
flowing through the world these hundreds of years. You know 
that men have been trying to find the source of the Nile. Wouldn't 
it be as profitable to try and find the source of grace, because this 
is a stream we are all interested in. I want to call your attention 
392 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 393 

to the first chapter of John, the 14th and 17th verses: "And the 
word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, 
the glory as of the only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and 
truth.'' Then the 17th verse: "For the law is given by Moses, 
but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." Then in the 5th 
chapter of Romans, the 15th verse : " But not as the offense, so 
also is the free gift. For if through the offense of one many be 
dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace which is 
by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many." 

FREE GIFT FOR MANY. 

There it is called the free gift — it abounded unto many. Then 
in Paul's epistle to the Corinthians, the 1st chapter and the 3d 
verse: "Grace be unto you and peace from God, our Father, and 
from the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God always on your 
behalf for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ." 
Now bear in mind that He is the God of all grace. We wouldn't 
know anything about grace if it wasn't for Jesus Christ. Men 
talk about grace, but they don't know much about it. These bank- 
ers, they talk about grace. If you want to borrow a thousand 
dollars, if you can give good security, they will let you have it and 
take your note, and you give your note and say, "So many months 
after date I promise to pay a thousand dollars." 

Then they give you what they call three days' grace, but they 
make you pay interest for those three days. That ain't grace. 
Then when your note comes due, if you can't pay but nine hun- 
dred and fifty dollars, they would sell everything you have got and 
make you pay the fifty dollars. Grace is giving the interest, prin- 
cipal, and all. I tell you, if you want to get any grace, you must 
know God. He is the God of all grace. He wants to deal in 
grace ; He wants to deal with that unmerited mercy, unde- 
served favor, unmerited love ; and if God don't love man until he 
is worthy of His love, He won't have time for very much love for 
him ; He is the God of all grace. 

Unto whom does He offer grace ? I would like to have you 
turn to your Bibles to two or three texts; to the 21st chapter of 



394 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

Matthew, the 28th verse: "But what think ye? A certain man 
had two sons and he came to the first and said, Son, go work to- 
day in my vineyard. He answered and said, I will not ; but after- 
ward he repented and went. And he came to the second and said 
likewise. But he answered and said, I go, sir; and went not. 
Whether of them twain did the will of his father ? They say unto 
him, The first. Jesus saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That 
the publicans and the harlots go into the Kingdom of God before 
you." Why? Because He loved those publicans and harlots more 
than He did those Pharisees ? No ; it was because they wouldn't 
repent, because they wouldn't take grace. They didn't believe they 
needed the grace of God. 

FIRST STEP IN SALVATION. 

A man who believes that he is lost is near salvation. Why? 
Because you haven't got to work to convince him that he is lost. 
Now here is a man that said he wouldn't go, and then he saw that 
he was wrong, and repented and went, and this man was the man 
that grace held up. Any man or an} T woman here to-night who 
will repent and turn to God, God will save them. It don't make 
any difference what your life has been in the past. He will turn 
to any that will turn to Him. I was preaching one Sunday in a 
church where there was a fashionable audience, and after I got 
through the sermon I said: "If there are any that would like to 
tarry a little while, and would like to stay and talk, I would be 
glad to talk with you." They all got up, turned around, and went 
out. I felt as though I was abandoned. When I was going out I 
saw a man getting behind the furnace. He hadn't any coat on, 
and he was weeping bitterly. I said, "My friend, what is the 
trouble?" He said, " You told me to-night that I could be saved ; 
that the grace of God would reach me. You told me that there 
wasn't a man so far gone but the grace of God would reach him. ,, 
He said: " I am an exile from my family ; I have drunk up twenty 
thousand dollars within the last few months ; I have drunk up the 
coat off my back, and if there is hope for a poor sinner like me I 
should like to be saved." It was just like a cup of refreshment to 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 395 

talk to that man. I didn't dare give him money for fear that he 
would drink it up, but I got him a place to stay that night, took an 
interest in him, and got him a coat, and six months after that, when 
I left Chicago for Europe — four months after — that man was one 
of the most earnest Christian men I knew. The Lord had blessed 
him wonderfully. He was an active, capable man. The grace of 
God can save just such if they will only repent. I don't care how 
low he has become, the grace of God can purge him of all sin, and 
place him among the blessed. In proportion as a man is a sinner 
much more does the grace of God abound. There isn't a man but 
that the grace of God will give him the victory if he will only 
accept it. 

A MOTHER'S EARNEST APPEAL. 

I want you to turn a moment to a passage you will find in the 
7th chapter of Mark : "And from thence He arose, and went 
into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and entered into a house, and 
would have no man know it ; but He could not be hid. For a cer- 
tain woman whose young daughter had an unclean spirit heard 
Him, and came and fell at His feet. The woman was a Greek, a 
Syro-Phcenician by nation ; and she besought Him that He wculd 
cast forth the devil out of her daughter. But Jesus said unto her, 
Let the children first be filled, for it is not meet to take the chil- 
dren's bread and cast it unto the dogs. And she answered and 
said unto Him, Yes, Lord ; yet the dogs under the table eat of the 
children's crumbs. And He said unto her, For this saying go thy 
way ; the devil is gone out of thy daughter." 

Now, just see how Christ dealt with that women — a Syro- 
Phcenician, a Gentile ; she didn't belong to the seed of Abraham 
at all. He came to save His own, but His own received Him not. 
Christ was willing to give to the Jews grace. He dealt in grace 
with a liberal hand, but those that He was desirous to shower 
grace upon wouldn't take it. But this woman belonged to a dif- 
ferent people — and just hear her story. 

I wonder what would happen if Christ should come and speak 
that way now ? Suppose He should come into this assembly and 



396 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

take any woman Here and call Her a dog. WHy, that Syro-PHce- 
nician woman migHt Have said, "Call me a dog! Talk to me like 
tHat ! WHy I know a woman wHo belongs to the seed of AbraHam 
wHo lives down near me, and sHe is tHe worst and meanest woman 
in tHe neigHborHood. I am as good as sHe is any day." SHe 
migHt Have gone away witHont a blessing if sHe Had not felt Her 
utter destitution and lost condition. But Jesus only said tHat to 
Her just to try Her, and after calling Her a dog, sHe only broke 
forth, into a despairing cry, " Yes, Lord — yes, Lord." CHrist Had 
said it was more blessed to give tHan to receive. 

ASKED FOR CRUMBS AND RECEIVED A LOAF. 

SHe took His place and received His blessing and His com- 
mands. SHe was satisfied to be given only a crumb, as long as 
He Heard Her petition. So, instead of giving Her a crumb, sHe got 
a wHole loaf. And so will you get tHe fullest beneficence of CHrist 
if you lift your Heart up to Him. OH, tHat many would but just 
take Her place, understand How low and unwortHy tHey are, and 
cry unto Jesus. If you do, CHrist will lift you up and bless you. 
But tHen tHe great trouble is tHat people will not confess tHat tHey 
Have need of grace. SucH miserable PHarisaism is tHe worst 
feature of tHe present time. THey tHink tHey can get salvation 
without tHe grace of God. THe old saying is tHat wHen you come 
to Jesus as a beggar you go away as a prince. Instead of doing 
tHat, tHey feel so self-confident and proud tHat tHey come always 
as princes and go away beggars. 

If you want tHe Son of God to deal with you, come as a 
beggar and He will Have mercy upon you. Look at tHe great 
crowd going up to the Temple : tHey feel tHey Have strength of 
themselves, and all pass on, proud and HaugHty, except one poor 
man, wHo smites Himself on the breast and says, " God be merciful 
to me a sinner." 

If you want to see tHe idea that the Jews Had as to wHo was 
wortHy, and How tHey tHougHt tHat tHat kind of worthiness sHould 
be rewarded, just take your Bibles and look at the 7tH cHapter of 
Luke. It reads there, "Now wHen He Had ended all His sayings 



ABOUNDING GRACE. &9? 

in the audience of the people, He entered into Capernaum. And 
a certain Centurion's servant who was dear unto Him was sick and 
ready to die. And when he heard of Jesus he sent unto Him the 
elders of the Jews, beseeching Him that He would come and heal 
His servant. And when they came to Jesus they besought Him 
instantly" — now, just listen — "saying that he was worthy for 
whom He should do this." Yes, that was the Jews' idea of the 
reason He should come, because he was " worthy." What made 
him worthy? "For he loveth our nation, and he hath built us a 
synagogue." 

HAD BUILT A SYNAGOGUE. 

He was not worthy because he was a sinner ; oh, no ; not at 
all. But he was worthy because " he hath built us a synagogue." 
Ha ! that was the same old story — the story of the present day. 
There is a great deal of that now. Give that man the most prom- 
inent place in church ; let him have the best pew and the one 
furthest up in church, because he is "worthy." He has built the 
church perhaps ; or he has endowed a seminary. No matter where 
his money came from. He may have got it gambling in stocks, or 
doing something else of a like character ; but he has given it to us. 
Oh, yes, he is worthy. He may have made his enormous gains by 
distilling whiskey even. Make room for him, he has got a gold 
ring on ; make room for her, she has got a good dress on. 

So said the Jews ; now, Lord, come at once, for he hath built a 
synagogue. Oh, he is worthy. You must not refuse or halt; You 
must come at once. That was the Jews' idea, and it is the idea of 
the world to-day. But how do you expect to get grace that way? 
The moment you put it on the ground of being worthy of it, then 
to receive it would not be grace at all. It would only amount to 
this; that if the Lord should give a man grace because He owed it 
to him, He would only be paying a debt. Jesus, however, went 
with them in this instance to teach them a lesson. 

Luke goes on to say: "Then Jesus went with them. And 
when He was not far from the house, the Centurion sent friends to 
Him saying unto Him, Lord trouble not Thyself for I am not 



398 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof." That is the 
kind of humility we want ; that is the kind of men we are hunting 
after — a man that is not worthy. See how quick he will be saved 
when he is in that frame of mind. I suppose that some one had 
run in to tell this Centurion that Jesus was approaching the house. 
And the Centurion sent to Him to say he was not worthy that 
He should come unto him, " neither thought I myself worthy to 
come unto Thee; but say in a word and my servant shall be healed." 
This Centurion had faith at any rate. 

A VERY COMMON MISTAKE. 

If he thought himself unworthy to come to Jesus, he sent 
friends whom he considered better than himself. How common it 
is to think yourself good and all other people bad. It is good to 
see a man consider himself a poor, unworthy man. "God, I didn't 
think myself worthy to come unto Thee, but say the word and my 
servant shall be healed." Thank God, he had faith. No matter 
how many sins we have if we onl}- have faith. In this case, because 
he had faith Jesus healed his servant without coming to him at all. 
He hadn't to go to the house and examine his pulse, and see his 
tongue. Then he didn't have to write out a prescription and send 
him to the drug store. No; He said, "All right, your servant shall 
live." "For I also am a man set under authority, having under 
me soldiers, and I say, unto one, Go, and he goeth ; and to another, 
Come, and he cometh ; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it. 
When Jesus heard these things, He marvelled." 

It is only twice, I think, that Jesus marvelled. He marvelled 
at the unbelief of the Jews; and again, at the faith of the Cen- 
turion — "and turned Him about and said unto the people that 
followed Him, I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, 
not in Israel." Here is a Gentile, he said in effect, here is a man 
not of the seed of Abraham, and } T et what faith he shows ! Why, 
here is a Centurion, and he has more faith than the chosen people 
of God. Jesus granted the petition at once. When he saw a 
genuine check presented for payment He cashed it at once. He 
pays instantly in the gold of heaven, without any hesitation or 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 399 

discount. " And they that were sent, returning to the house, found 
the servant whole that had been sick." Found him perfectly well, 
leaping and dancing around the house, praising God. He had 
been at the point of death one minute, and the next he had been 
made perfectly well. 

You may be made whole too, friends. You may even on the 
borders of hell, and yet be made an inhabitant of the Kingdom of 
Heaven. Think of this you men that are the slaves of strong 
drink. You may be mangled and bruised by sin, but the grace of 
God can save you. He is the God of grace. I hope that grace 
will flow into your souls to-night. Christ is the sinner's friend. If 
you have read your Bibles carefully you will see that Christ always 
took the side of the sinner. Of course, He came down on the hypo- 
crites, and well He might. Those haughty Pharisees He took sides 
against, but where a poor, miserable, humble, penitent sinner came 
to Him for grace He always found it. You always read that He 
deals in grace, and to-night He will have mercy upon you that 
confess your sins to Him. If you want to be saved come right 
straight to Him. He comes to deal in grace : He comes to bless, 
and why don't you let him ? Let Him bless you now. Let Him 
take your sins away now. 

STUMBLING OVER FREE GRACE. 

A man said to me the other night, "I feel I have got to do 
something." I said to him, " If this grace is unmerited and free, 
what are you going to do ?" And I warn you to-night, my friends, 
against trying to work out your own salvation. It really is a question 
whether it don't keep more people out of the Kingdom of God than 
anything else. When at Newcastle, I was preaching one night, 
and I said that grace was free ; that all were to stop trying to be 
saved. A woman came down and said to me : " Oh ! how wretched 
I am ; I have been trying to be a Christian, and yet you have been 
telling me to-night not to try." " Has that made you wretched ?" 
I asked. "Yes; if I stop trying, what will become of me?" I 
said : " But if grace is free what are you going to do ? You can- 
not get it by working." She said, " I can't understand it." 



400 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

Well, let me call your attention now to a few passages of 
Scripture. I turn to the 2d chapter of Ephesians and the 8th and 
9th verses : " For by grace are ye saved through faith ; and that 
not of yourselves, it is the gift of God :" — " Not of works, lest any 
man should boast." 

Salvation is a gift from God. If a man worked it out, he would 
boast of what he had done, and say, "O, I did it." A Scotchman 
once said it took two persons to effect his salvation — " God gave me 
His grace and I fought against Him." It is not then for men to 
work, or they will boast of it, and when a man boasts you may be 
sure there is no conversion. The Ethiopian cannot change his 
skin, neither can the leopard change his spots. We do not work 
to get salvation, but we work it out after we get it. If we are ever 
saved it must be by grace alone. If you pay anything for salva- 
tion it ceases to be a gift. But God isn't down here selling salva- 
tion. And what have you to give Him if He was ? What do you 
suppose you would give ? Ah, we're bankrupt. " The gift of God 
is eternal life;" that's your hope. "He that climbeth up some 
other way, the same is a thief and a robber." 

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MARTHA AND MARY. 

Now who will take salvation to-night ? Oh, you may have it 
if you will. " To him that worketh the reward is not reckoned of 
grace but of death." The difference between Martha and Mary 
was that Martha was trying to do something for the Lord, and 
Mary was just taking something from Him as a gift. He'll smile 
upon you if you'll just take grace from Him. " It's to him that 
worketh not but believeth," that blessings come. After you get to 
the Cross, there you may work all you can. If you are lost, you 
go to hell in the full blaze of the Gospel. That grace is free to all. 
To every policeman here, every fireman, every usher, every singer, 
every man, woman and child, every reporter, all of you. 

What more do you want God to do than he has done ? Oh, I 
hope the grace of God will reach every heart here. O, be wise, and 
open the door of your hearts and let in the King of Glory. You'll 
be saved when you believe. It is written, " For the grace of God 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 401 

hath appeared, bringing salvation to all." If you are lost one thing 
you must do, and that is trample the grace of God under your feet. 
It won't be because you can't be saved, but because you won't. 

Now I want to call your attention to the 5th chapter of Romans 
and the 20th verse : " Moreover, the law entered that the offense 
might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more 
abound. That as sin had reigned unto death, even so might grace 
reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ, our 
Lord." Now sin reigns unto death. The penalty of the law of 
God is death. " The soul that sinneth, it shall die." No use of 
having a law if there is not a penalty attached to the disobedience 
of it. 

A LAW THAT WOULD BE USELESS. 

Suppose the State of New York should pass a law that you 
shall not steal or that you shall not murder, and put no penalty to 
the infraction of that law. What would be the use of that law ? 
What would it be good for ? Now sin hath reigned unto death, but 
grace hath reigned unto eternal life. It don't stop with death, 
grace don't. It carries us past death — right through the grave, 
clear over into the Promised Land. Now, in the closing verses of 
Deuteronomy, and in the 1st chapter of Joshua, you read that 
Moses brought the children of Israel down to Jordan. 

But he couldn't bring them any further. He was the repre- 
sentative of the law, and that is where the law brings us to — to 
Jordan. Jordan means death, judgment. After bringing them to 
death and judgment, he couldn't bring them any further, but left 
them there. The law brings us to death, and there it leaves us. 
It don't give life ; it never has given life, and it never can. Sin 
reigns unto death, but the grace of God hath reigned unto eternal 
life. So when Moses had brought the children of Israel down to 
Jordan, and couldn't go any further, then came Joshua and took 
the congregation over and away on their journey. Joshua means 
Jesus. 

And as Joshua led them past the Jordan, so Jesus will take 
His people through the dark valley of the shadow of death unto 

2G 



402 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

eternal life. He is the Good Shepherd and He came to save His 
people from their sins. When John came he appeared as the fore- 
runner of grace and Jesus. He was the last representative of the 
old dispensation. He brought the people who came to be baptized 
down into the Jordan, and he left them in Jordan. When Christ 
came He commenced where John left off. He went into the Jordan 
and brought the people out of it. That is the difference between 
law and grace ; law slays a man, but grace makes him live ; the 
law takes a man to death and judgment, but Christ comes and 
quickens him, giving eternal life. 

DISTINCTION BETWEEN LAW AND GRACE. 

There is a great difference then between law and grace, and I 
want you to bear this in mind and keep the distinction between the 
two separate and clear in your minds. Let me repeat: Law leads 
unto death, but grace to eternal life b}^ Jesus Christ our Lord. 
Some people are lingering around Sinai yet — around the old dis- 
pensation — around the law. You can't get them to come away 
from Horeb. It is better to come to the Mount of Olives, better to 
come to Calvary. 

Now I want to carry you to another verse, the 14th of the 6th 
chapter of Romans. There it is written : " For sin shall not have 
dominion over you ; for ye are not under the law, but under grace. 
W^hat, then, shall we sin because we are not under the law, but 
under grace? God forbid." Bear that in mind; ye are not under 
the law, but under grace. The Lord Jesus came to bring us out 
from under the law. It is not any more thou shalt not do this ; 
thou shalt not do that. That was the law. Under that dispensation 
it was to do and live — now it is live and do. Christ came and says, 
"If you love Me, keep My commandments." Before that it was 
thou shalt not do this or that. But grace reigns unto eternal life 
by Him, and if you love Him you will keep His commandments, 
and grace shall bring }^ou unto everlasting happiness. Yet, not- 
withstanding all these plain texts, some will still have it that we 
are not under grace, but remain under the law. 

Now just turn to the 21st chapter of Deuteronomy and the 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 403 

iStli verse, and you will see what would happen under this law: 
" If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey 
the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when 
they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them, then shall 
his father and his mother lay hold on him and bring him out unto 
the elders of his city and unto the gate of his place. And they 
shall say unto the elders of his city, This, our son, is stubborn and 
rebellious ; he will not obey our voice ; he is a glutton and drunk- 
ard. And all the men of the city shall stone him with stones that 
he die ; so shalt thou put evil away from among you, and all Israel 
shall hear and fear." 

OLD PENALTIES ABOLISHED. 

A very strange state of things would take place now if we lived 
under the law. Think of a man in these days taking his son and 
have the Aldermen of the city come and stone him to death. It 
would be pretty effectual in breaking up the rum-shops and the 
whiskey-selling saloons. A man takes his son, who is a confirmed 
drunkard, and kills him or has him killed — wouldn't that soon put 
a stop to the buying and selling of this vile whiskey and intoxi- 
cating and maddening stuff that is now going on throughout the 
country? The distillers would have a good deal of whiskey on 
their hands. 

But grace deals differently with men. See the prodigal son. 
He went away and lived a low and vicious life. He squandered all 
he had. He was a drunkard and spent his substance on harlots 
and thieves. How did his father treat him ? Did his father take 
him out and have him stoned to death ? No. That would have 
been his end under the law I have read to you ; but see how his 
father acted towards him under grace. He met him with a kiss 
and treated him with kindness and love. The law says, " Stone 
him;" but grace says, " Forgive him." When Moses was in Egypt 
to punish Pharaoh, he turned the waters into blood. When Christ 
was on earth He turned the water into wine. That is the difference 
between law and grace. The law says, " Kill him ;" grace, " For- 
give." Law says, " Let him die ;" grace says " Love him." 



404 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

Law makes us crooked ; grace straightens us. Law makes 
us vile ; grace cleanses us. That is the difference between law 
and grace. When the law came out of Horeb three thousand men 
were lost. At Pentecost, under grace, three thousand men got 
life. What a difference ? When Moses came to the burning bush, 
he was commanded to take the shoes from off his feet. When the 
prodigal came home after sinning he was given a pair of shoes to 
put on his feet. I would a thousand times rather be under grace 
than under the law. 

THE LAW HOLDS A ROD OVER YOU. 

Why, the law is a schoolmaster ; a cold, severe man that is 
continually holding a rattan over you. Well, some of us know 
what that means. You know what it is to see a rattan, and per- 
haps to feel it. Thou shalt do this, and thou shalt do that. That 
is the law, with a rattan at the back of it. But under grace the 
schoolmaster tries to rule the school with kindness and love. He 
says if you love me do this, if you love me don't do that. The 
schoolmaster that I was taught by was a harsh, severe man. 
It was a word and a blow with him, and generally the blow came 
first. I knew what it was to have severity in my school days, and 
I also knew what it was to have kindness. After that stern school- 
teacher came a kind-hearted lady, who commenced to rule by love. 

Well, we thought we should have a grand time — do just as we 
pleased — didn't fear her. The first time that I broke a rule through, 
instead of seeing a rattan in her hand, I saw tears in her eyes. 
That was good deal worse than a stick or a rawhide to me. She 
asked me to remain after school. And when we were alone she 
took me by the hand and talked to me in a low, kind voice with the 
tears in her eyes. If you love me, she said, keep my rules. I tell 
you I never broke a rule after that. Her kind words went straight 
to my heart. But take a further view of this difference between 
law and grace. 

Here is a boy in school, and the master's name is Mr. Law. 
He holds his cane over him and says, in a cold, severe tone, " thou 
shalt not do this, and thou shalt not do that." This went on for 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 405 

some time, and there was no love or affection between the boy and 
his teacher. But by-and-by the head master comes and takes the 
pupil ont of that room and puts him in another class, the teacher 
of which is Mr. Grace. The boy, yon see, can't be in both rooms 
at the same time — can't have both teachers at the same time. Now, 
we are not under law, but under grace, and all the Lord wants is 
to deal in grace, and bring us out from the curse of the law ; He 
wants to partake of love with every one. 

NOT UNDER LAW, BUT GRACE. 

Thank God, I am not under the law to-night, but under grace, 
and as I said last night, the Lord Jesus is trying to reach every 
man by grace. A friend of mine, the last time I was in England, 
told me this story — gave me this illustration of grace. Suppose, 
said he, that a man had a beautiful farm on the side of the moun- 
tain. Everything was in an enclosure. He had a great wall all 
around it. Everything within the walls was bright and green, 
while everything outside was hot and dried up. One day there 
came a messenger to the man that had the beautiful farm, and he 
said to him: "Sir, you have a beautiful and flourishing farm, but 
I want to make it better. I will increase its fertility ; I will make 
it a thousand times better than it now is." " No," says the farmer, 
" my farm is good enough ; you can do nothing to better it ;" and 
drove him away. He wouldn't have Ms farm made better, and he 
built his walls still higher to keep all men out. Up in the moun- 
tain near the house was a fountain. Its stream was used to irri- 
gate and beautify the farm, and from it the crystal waters came to 
the garden. 

And the man that sent to him said to himself, " This man 
won't let me make his garden more beautiful; he won't accept my 
kindness. I will build up a wall and cut the stream off." When 
the wall arose around the fountain's head the waters ceased to 
flow to the farm ; the flowers began to fade and wither, and soon 
everything presented the appearance of desolation and ruin. So 
the Lord of Glory comes and wants to give us grace, but we spurn 
it, refuse to accept His blessing, and we perish. 



406 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

Why, Christ had the hardest work of his ministration to teach 
this subject even to his apostles. When they were offered grace 
they wouldn't have it. They couldn't keep grace in the country. 
They built up a wall of unbelief, the stream of grace ceased to 
flow to them, and what was the result ? The garden that once was 
there is now the only dried up and withered spot on the whole 
mountain round about. Grace has flowed out to the Gentiles and 
to all the nations, and what a blessing it has been! It was just 
because they built a wall of unbelief. That is just what the sinner 
is doing now. But if you'll only let the grace flow, nothing can 
hinder you from getting a blessing. 

HOW TO PARTAKE OF THE GIFT. 

And now the question comes, How are we to become partakers 
of this grace? In the 4th chapter of Hebrews and 16th verse, we 
read; "Let us come boldly to the throne of grace, and find grace 
and strength to help in time of need." God wants us to come and 
get all the grace we need. The reason why there are so many 
half-starved Christians is because they don't come to the throne of 
grace. It is related of Alexander that he gave one of his generals, 
who had pleased him, permission to draw on his treasurer for any 
sum. When the draft came in the treasurer was scared, and 
wouldn't pay it until he saw his master. And when the treasurer 
told him what he had done, Alexander said, " Don't you know he 
has honored me and my kingdom by making a large draft?" So 
we honor God by making a large draft on Him. 

If there is a drunkard here who wishes to get control of his 
appetite, all he has got to do is to come and get all the grace he 
needs. You can get enough to overcome every trial and sorrow. 
When Dr. Arnot was in this country — he is now in heaven — I 
heard him use in a sermon an illustration that impressed me. He 
said : " Haven't you ever been in a home where the family were at 
dinner, and haven't you seen the old family dog standing near and 
watching his master, and looking at every morsel of food as if he 
wished he had it ? If his master drops a crumb he at once licks it 
up and devours it, but if he should set the dish of roast beef down 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 407 

and say, 'Come come,' he wouldn't touch it — it's too much for him. 
So with God's children; they are willing to take a crumb, but 
refuse when God wants them to go for the platter." God wants 
you to come right to the throne of grace, and to come boldly. 

A while ago I learned from the Chicago papers that there had 
been a run on the banks there and many of them were broken. 
What a good thing it would be to get up a run on the bank of 
heaven! What a glorious thing to get up a run on the throne of 
grace ! God is able to help thee and deliver thee if you will only 
come to Him. That's what grace is for. I want you to turn to the 
8th verse of the 9th chapter of II. Corinthians. I want you to 
mark that verse. If you have got your Bibles with you, draw a 
black mark right around that verse. Many want to know why 
Christians fail. It's because they don't come to God for grace. It's 
not because He hasn't got the ability. Men fail because they try 
to do too large a business on too small a capital. 

AN EXHAUSTLESS BANK. 

So with Christians ; but God has got grace enough and capital 
enough. What would you think of a man who had one million 
dollars in the bank and only drew out a penny a day ? That's you 
and I, and the sinners is blinder than we are. The throne of grace 
is established, and there we are to get all the grace we need. Sin 
is not so strong as the arm of God. He will help and deliver you 
if you will come and get the grace you need. 

Now, take all the afflictions that flesh is heir to, and all the 
troubles and trials of this life — no matter how numerous — and God 
has grace enough to carry you right through without a shadow. 
Some people borrow all the trouble they can from the past and the 
future, and then multiply it by ten, and get a big load, and go on reel- 
ing and staggering under it. If you ask them to help any one else, 
they say they can't — they've got enough to do to take care of their 
own ; forgetting "Casting all your care on Him, for he careth for 
you." 

A man was once travelling along a highway, and he overtook 
one carrying a heavy burden on his back, and he asked him to ride. 



408 ABOUNDING GRACE. 

But the man, after He got up, kept his bundle on, saying, "I am 
willing to carry it if I can only get a ride." So many are content 
to be nominal Christians, and go along with great loads and bur- 
dens. What is the throne of grace for but to help you carry your 
burden? God says, "Come," and "As your day so shall your 
strength be." I suppose w r e all have thorns in the flesh. Instead 
of praying God to take the thorns out, let us pray for grace to bear 
them. Let us live day by day, casting our care on God. In this 
5th chapter of Romans there are these precious words — peace for 
the past, grace for the present, glory for the future. Some think 
that when they get to Calvary they have got all. They have j ust 
commenced. By and by we shall see the King in His beauty. The 
glory is just beyond. 

NO SPECIAL GRACE UNTIL YOU NEED IT. 

A man said to me some time ago, " Moody, have you got grace 
to go to the stake as a martyr ?" "No, what do I want to go to 
the stake for ? " A person said to me, " Moody, if God should take 
your son have you grace to bear it?" I said, " What do I want 
grace for ? I don't want grace to bear that which has not been 
sent. If God should call upon me to part with my boy He would 
give me strength to bear it. " What we want is grace for the present, 
to bear the trials and temptations for every day. " As thy day so 
shall thy strength be." 

The woman who had lost her husband went to Elisha with a 
story that would move the heart of Elisha or any one else. Her 
husband had died a bankrupt and they would sell her boys into 
slavery. She came to Elisha and told her story. He asked her 
what she had to pay. She replied a pot of oil. Elisha told her to 
go home, "borrow vessels not a few, take oil and pour into the 
empty vessels." Men in these times wouldn't believe in this. They 
would say, " What, take a pot of oil and pour into all these vessels 
— what good will that do ?" Not so this poor widow. She has faith 
and does as she is told. 

She goes to her neighbors and asks for vessels ; they can 
lend her a few. She takes all they have and goes on. She clears 



ABOUNDING GRACE. 409 

out the next house, and the next, and the next. " Borrow," says 
the prophet, and she goes on until her house is filled with ves- 
sels. " Now close the doors," she says to her sons. And she pours 
oil into the first vessel and fills it full, and the next, and the next, 
and the next in the same way. She pours it in, and pours it in, and 
the boys run and get more vessels, until the house is full of oil. 
Then she goes to Elisha and asks what she shall do. He tells her 
" go" sell the oil and pay the debt. Now, Christ pays the debt and 
gives us enough to live on besides. He doesn't merely pay our 
debt — He gives us enough to live on. He gives according to our 
need. " As thy day so shall thy strength be." 

Rowland Hill tells a story of a rich man and a poor man of 
his congregation. The rich man came to Mr. Hill with a sum of 
money which he wished to give to the poor man, and asked Mr. 
Hill to give it to him as he thought best, either all at once or in 
small amounts. Mr. Hill sent the poor man a five-pound note with 
the indorsement — "More to follow." Now which do you think 
did the most good ? Every few months came the remittance with 
the same message — " More to follow." Now, that's grace. "More 
to follow" — yes, thank God, there's more to follow. Oh, wondrous 
grace ! May the grace of God reach every heart in this assem- 
blage to-night is my earnest prayer. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

Weak Things Employed to Confound the Mighty. 

¥OUR attention is called to the 27th. verse of 1 Cor. 1, that 
chapter I read to you: "But God hath chosen the foolish 
things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath 
chosen the weak things to confound the things that are mighty ; 
and base things of the world, and things which are despised hath 
God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught 
things that are. That no flesh should glory in his presence." 

There is just one sentence there I would like to call your 
attention to: "But God hath chosen the weak things of the world 
to confound the things which are mighty." Then in the 29th 
verse He tells us why He has chosen the weak things — "that no 
flesh may glory in His presence.'' 

Now, if we are to have the Word in this city, we must give 
God all the glory. I dread coming to a new place; it takes almost 
a week or a fortnight to come down to solid work. The people are 
thinking of the choir, and saying "What a large choir!" and "So 
many ministers ! Surely there is going to be great work now, there 
is such a great choir and congregation and so many ministers." It 
is not by might and power, but by God's spirit, and we have got to 
get our eyes off of all these things, and there will be no work and no 
blessing until this is done. Now, we have not come with any new 
Gospel; it is the old Gospel, the old story, and we want the old 
power, the power of the Holy Ghost; and, if it is anything less 
than that, it will all come to naught and be like a morning cloud — 
soon pass away. 

Now I can tell you, before the meetings go on any further, 
who will be disappointed and who in after years will say the meet- 
ings were a failure — every man and every woman that don't get 
quickened themselves. If there is a minister here in this city that 
doesn't get quickened himself, he will say the work has failed ; but 
410 



WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 411 

I have never known a man who has got quickened to say the work 
has failed. Nowhere that we have been has it been the case. 
AY hat we want is to get down to ourselves, and if there is 10 be a 
true revival, there must be first a casting down of ourselves before 
a lifting up. It was only when Abraham was on his face in the 
dust before God that He would talk to him. 

NEED OF DIVINE QUICKENING. 

And it is then that God lifts us up and the blessing comes. 
There is no true revival until God's own people are lifted, until 
they are quickened. It will be superficial until then. It will be a 
counterfeit. If you attempt to begin to work among the ungodly 
and unconverted before you get quickened yourself, God won't 
bless you. As the Psalmist says, "When the Lord has restored to 
us the joy of his salvation, then we will be able to teach transgres- 
sors the way of the Kingdom of God," and not until then, and 
when we are cold and lukewarm and are conformed to the world, 
and have not the Holy Ghost resting upon us, why God is not 
going to revive His work. Here and there we will hear of one 
converted, but it won't be deep and thorough unless the Church of 
God is quickened. 

Now, I have just come here, and I confess I have seen nothing 
in America like what has pleased me in Princeton. I think they 
have a revival there, and the President of the college told me he 
had not seen anything like it, and one of the Faculty told me he 
didn't think there had ever been anything like it in the history of 
Princeton. Of course I inquired into it, and I found that they had 
sent for different ministers to come there and had been disap- 
pointed, and they got together — the Christians did — and prayed 
God to bless them, and one of the Faculty asked them to pray for 
him, and right there the work broke out, and there have been about 
fifty quickened and brought back who had wandered from Christ, 
and it looks now as if all Princeton was going to be blessed. 

Oh, that it may commence here to-night in our hearts ; that 
we may be quickened first, and then how quick the Lord will bless 
us. If you want to introduce two men to each other you want to 



412 WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 

be near to them. If you want to introduce sinners to God you 
must be near to God and to the sinner, too ; and if a man is near 
God he will have a love for the sinner and his heart will be near 
that man. But until we are brought near to God ourselves, we 
cannot introduce men to God. Somebody has said God uses 
the vessel that is nearest at hand, and if we are near to God He will 
use us, and if we are not of course He cannot. Now what we want 
is to be in a position that will give God all the glory. 

EVIL OF MAN-WORSHIP. 

There are some things that make me tremble at times as if the 
work will all come to naught, because there is so much man-wor- 
ship. Now, we have got to get rid of this man- worship before it 
will be a deep work. We have got to sink self. If we can only get 
" I " down in the dust and get outside of our dignity and get self 
out of the way and say, "Here, Lord, use me if Thou canst, and, 
if not, use somebody else," or in the spirit of the wilderness 
preacher who said, "I must decrease, but He must increase," then 
the Lord will take us up and use us. 

And right here, before I forget it, I want to urge the people of 
this city — the Christian people — not to buy anything of these 
people on the street. I am told that sixty-five men have come on 
from another town to sell photographs and medals, and I don't 
know what not, and they are hawking them in the streets. Why, 
I would almost think nobody would come into the meeting if, when 
coming along, they hear these men crying the photographs. I 
believe that Christian people who patronize these men are doing 
the cause of Christ a great injury. I don't know that anything is 
hindering the work more than these men, that are making 
money out of us. If you want hymn-books, go into some book- 
store and buy them. Don't buy these photographs. They are no 
more photographs of us than they are of you. I have not had one 
taken for eight years. [Laughter.] 

Some men complained that they had got counterfeits, and I 
was glad they had been cheated, because they ought not to buy 
them so on the street. People are apt to say of us, " Those fellows 



WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 413 

are speculating. They are just making money. They don't care 
anything about saving our souls." And the impression has gone 
abroad just on account of people's patronizing these men. Oh! 
let me beg of you to do anything to keep down this man-worship. 
Let us look at the Cross, with Christ full in view, and then we will 
have men coming into the Kingdom of God. 

POWER OF WEAK THINGS. 

Now, let us get back to the text. It is the weak things that 
God wants to use. We want the great, the mighty, but God takes 
the foolish things, the despised things, the things which are not. 
What for ? That no flesh may glory in His sight. Now, what is 
that written for unless it is that we shall learn the lesson that God 
shall have the glory, and that we are not to take any of the glory 
to ourselves ? "That no flesh may glory in His sight ?" Just the 
moment we are ready to take our places in the dust and give God 
His place, and let Him have all the glory, then it is that the Spirit 
of God will be given to us. If we are lifted up and say we have 
got such great meetings and such crowds are coming, and get to 
thinking about crowds and about the people, and get our minds off 
from God, and are not constantly in communion with Him, lifting 
our hearts in prayer, this work will be a stupendous failure. Now, 
you will find in all ages God has been trying to teach His children 
this lesson — that He uses the weak instead of the strong. 

What is highly esteemed of man is an abomination to God. 
When God was about to deluge the earth He wanted an ark built. 
What did He do — did He call an army? No, He just called one 
man to build the ark. In the sight of the world it was a very little 
thing, and yet when the deluge came it was worth more than all 
the world. The weak things of the world that excite our scorn 
and contempt are the very things that God uses. When God 
delivered Egypt He didn't send an army. We would have sent 
an army or an orator. We would have sent some man who would 
have gone down before the King, and laid it out before him in 
grand style, but God didn't do that. 

He sent this man Moses, who had been back there in the desert 



414 WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 

forty years, a man with an impediment in his speech — and God 
said to Moses, " Moses, I want yon to go down into Egypt and 
bring my people ont of bondage.' ' That is not onr way. When 
the King looked at him he ordered him ont of his presence, " Who 
is God, that I shonld obey Him ?" He found out who He was. 
God used the little fly and the little frog. The world looks upon 
the frog with scorn and contempt, but Moses said, " Oh, there are 
a good many of them." We may be very weak in ourselves, but 
see what a mighty God we have. God likes to take the weak 
things to confound the mighty. When God wants to move a 
mountain He does not take the bar of iron, but He takes the little 
worm. 

TOO STRONG TO GAIN SUCCESS. 

The fact is, we have got too much strength. We are not weak 
enough. It is not our strength that we want. One drop of God's 
strength is worth more than all the world. There was that giant 
whom, we are told, for forty days came out every morning and 
every evening. Down into that Valley came the Giant of Gath 
every morning, and he terrified all the army of Saul ; the whole 
army were trembling ; they were afraid. When Joshua was weak 
in himself and strong in the Lord, then they did not fear the giant. 
But you see Saul and his army had got their eyes off from God. 
When we get our eyes off from God how mighty that giant looks ! 
There came a young stripling up from the country — a sort of a 
delegate of the Christian commission. He heard of this giant, 
and the young boy began to inquire: "What does this mean?" 
And they told him, and he wanted to go right out at once to meet 
him. The last man we would have chosen, but God's ways are 
not our ways. 

God will have the glory, that is the point. If it had been 
some great giant, then we would have given the giant all the glory. 
The young stripling requires no army of Saul ; he j ust takes a 
few small, smooth, round stones out of the brook and puts them 
in his sling. He says to the giant : " You have your sword, but I 
have come in the name of my God." Yes, he leaned upon the 



WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 415 

strength of God. Now just look at that! We are to pass that 
little stone into that sling. God directs it, and the work is done. 
The Giant of Gath falls. David was the last one we would have 
chosen, though he is chosen of God. 

What we want is to learn the lesson -that we are weak, and we 
don't want any strength but God's strength. Look at Jonathan 
with his small army ! " Why," he says, " the Lord can save by 
few as well as many." It is not these great meetings that are 
going to do the work. It is not by might and by power, but by 
the spirit of God. But let me just impress this upon you that it 
is weakness that God wants. 

HEAVEN WAS ONCE IN TEARS. 

There was weeping once in heaven. John wept when the 
book of seals was brought out, and there wasn't any one who 
could open the book. He might have looked upon Abel, but Abel 
wasn't worthy to open the book. He might have looked upon 
Enoch, but Enoch wasn't worthy. He might have looked upon 
Abraham, and yet the father of the faithful wasn't worthy to open 
that book. There was Daniel and Elijah, and the holy men of the 
Old Testament, and not one of them worthy to open the book. 
Some of the saints of the New Testament had entered upon their 
reward. There was Stephen who was martyred. Stephen wasn't 
able to open the book. And John said he began to cry as he looked 
down, and there wasn't one worty to open the book. But pretty 
soon a voice said, " Don't weep; the Lion of the Tribe of Judah is 
able to open the seals;" and John began to look round to see the 
Lion, and lo, it was a Lamb. Instead of having strength we want 
weakness. It is the Lion — the Lamb of Calvary. He sealed the 
Lion of Hell, He overcame the Lion, He conquered him. 

What we want to-night is to ask God to give us weakness, not 
strength, then those obstacles, why how small they look ! When 
we are walking with God, all these obstacles how they flee away. 
Go up in a balloon and look down upon some giant and how small 
he looks. Go up into some mountain and look down upon some 
giant and how small he looks! But get on a level and how large he 



416 WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 

looks ! God takes the weak things to confound the mighty. When 
He wanted twelve men to introduce His Gospel, whom did He 
take ? £)id He call the wise and mighty ? No ; He called a few 
ignorant Galilean fishermen. It was those men the power of God 
rushed in upon. They were weak in themselves, but strong 
in God. 

So to-night, if there is a band weak in themselves but strong 
in God, what a work they can do! No other strength is worth hav- 
ing but the strength of God. When God wanted Germany to be 
blessed he gave power to one man. The Spirit came upon Martin 
Luther, and all Germany was blessed. When darkness and 
superstition was settling over Scotland, the Spirit of God came 
upon John Knox, and he moved all Scotland. You can go where 
you will in Scotland to-day, and everywhere you will hear the name 
and feel the influence of John Knox in that country. You can go 
into England to-day and you will feel the influence of Wesley and 
Whitfield, grand men and mighty. They relied not upon their 
own strength, for the Spirit of the Living God was upon them. 
They were mighty in God. 

AN ANCIENT MAN OF VALOR. 

Look at that mad Gideon. He marshalled his army of thirty 
thousand men to give battle to the Philistines. God said : " Gideon, 
your army is too great. My people would be lifted up, and they 
would take the glory upon themselves." God said to Gideon, "You 
just say to the men who are fearful and afraid 'Go home.'" And 
the Lord reduced the army twenty thousand, leaving only ten 
thousand men. But God said: " Gideon, you have got too many; 
ir those ten thousand men get victory, they will say, ' Look what 
we have done.' Just take them down to the water, and we will try 
them again. Those that drink it up one way and those that lap it 
up another, they shall be separated." Then God took away all but 
three hundred. God said that was enough. "If I get a victory 
with those three hundred, I will get the glory." I would rather 
have three hundred men in this city whose hearts are right with 
God than a host who take the glory which belongs to the Lord. 



WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 417 

I have no doubt but that some here will say, " There are so many 
obstacles in the way I don't believe we are going to succeed. You 
won't succeed in this city; it is a very hard place." If God is with 
us we are going to succeed. If we take God out of our plans we 
are going to fail, and we ought to fail. Is not the God of our 
fathers strong enough to take this city and shake it as a little child? 
There is not a skeptic in the city but what the power of God 
can reach. 

When we were in Philadelphia, we almost failed for a few 
weeks. The crowds were so great that many of those who attended 
the meetings spent most of their time in watching the people. We 
could not get their eyes towards the Cross for a long time. By and 
by, when the holidays came on, the numbers began to fall off, and 
it was the best thing for us. It was what we wanted, so that men 
could think of God. 

ONE MAN WITH GOD IS A HOST. 

Now, my friends, do not think that anything is small that God 
handles. Look at that little cloud up there, not bigger than a man's 
hand ; but that cloud was large enough to water all Palestine, and 
the land that had thirsted for three years and six months got all 
the water out of that cloud that it wanted. Plenty large enough if 
God is in it. Let me say before we close, that what we want is to 
get hold of God. Now, there are a great many people that lend 
their ears to other people. They never hear for themselves. They 
want you people to use their ears for them. 

Let us each go up for ourselves, and pray to God that we may 
get a blessing for ourselves. If the Spirit of the Lord God comes 
upon us it will take all eternity to tell the result. If the Spirit of 
God comes upon us afresh, I have no more doubt about the success 
of the meetings than I have that we exist. If we are cold and 
indifferent then the work will be superficial. It will not be lasting, 
and will not be such as many of you are praying for. Let us 
ask God that we may receive the blessing of the Holy Spirit. 
Let the prayer be " Oh ! God, quicken me. O ! God, give me a 
fresh baptism. Instill in me the blessing of thy salvation." 



418 WEAK THINGS CONFOUNDING THE MIGHTY. 

God said to Elijah just before he went away, " Go call Elisha 
to take thy place." If God calls us to a work, He can qualify us 
to do it. When the time drew near for Elijah to be taken from 
Elisha, Elijah said to Elisha, " I will go down and see the prophet." 
It had been revealed to Elij ah that Elisha was going to be taken 
out. Elisha wanted to be anointed near the place he was called to 
fill. They traveled together until they reached Bethel, and then 
Elijah said, " You stay here, and I will go down to Jericho and see 
how the prophets are getting along down there." But Elisha kept 
close to him, and they walked arm in arm to Jericho. When they 
reached Jericho, Elisha said, " You just stay here and I will go over 
to Jordan." They were on a tour of inspection of the theological 
seminaries. But Elisha still kept close to his companion, and as 
they were talking together, Elijah asked, "What can I do for you, 
Elisha ? What is your petition ? " " Well," says Elisha, " I want 
a double portion of your spirit." Well, that was a pretty bold peti- 
tion. He was asking great things. 

That is what God wants us to do — ask great things. The}^ 
came to the waters of the Jordan, and Elisha takes off his mantle, 
the waters spread, and they pass through safely, dry shod. While 
they were talking, there suddenly comes a chariot from heaven to 
bear Elijah away to glory. And Elisha takes up the mantle of 
Elijah, and Elisha goes back to Jordon ; and when they saw the 
mantle of Elijah they cried out, "The spirit of Elijah rests upon 
Elisha." The mighty spirit of Elijah rest upon us to-night. Let 
go to our closets, let us go to our homes, and let us cry to the God 
of Elijah — " Here I am, God, use me" — that we may be ready for 
all His services. Oh, that we may be weak in ourselves, that we 
may give all the honor and glory to Jesus, and if we do this we will 
see how quick He will use it. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

"The Gospel." 

fWANT to call your attention to a verse in the 4th chapter of 
the Gospel of Luke — the 18th verse: a The spirit of the Lord 

is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the Gospel 
to the poor." I have spoken a great many times in this city, but I 
believe I never preached the Gospel here but once. I have spoken 
a great many times in different parts of the city, but I have never 
preached the Gospel but once. I have tried to arouse Christians 
up to work. People are in the habit of thinking that anything 
that is in the way of a religious meeting is the Gospel, but they 
are mistaken. 

I have had quite a number of letters from Christians com- 
plaining because I don't preach the Gospel to the people. I want 
to tell you if I can what the Gospel of the Son of God is. I want 
to ask all those who are Christians here, to be silently lifting up 
their hearts in prayer that God may help me to make the way of 
life plain, and that every one may know w T hat the Gospel of God 
is. I believe I was converted years before I knew what the Gospel 
meant. Now the word Gospel means " good spell," or, in other 
words, " God's spell." 

When Christ commenced His Ministry, about His first words 
were, " The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed 
me to preach the Gospel to the poor." That don't mean those who 
are poor in this world's goods, but that means the poor in spirit. 
Christ says, " The Lord has anointed me," for that purpose. He 
had been out of Nazareth for a few weeks, and had gone down to 
Jordan, where He had met the great wilderness preacher. Christ 
had left Nazareth, and went to meet John, that man from the 
desert that was more like Elijah than any man since Elijah went 
up to heaven in a chariot of fire. There he met a great many 
people, ten thousands of people probably, and he was crying that 

419 



4.20 "THE GOSPEL." 

the Kingdom of God was at hand. Down there into the andience 
came a man, who passed down into the water, and He requested 
John to baptize Him. John said that he needed to be baptized of 
Him. But after the baptism there came a voice — God confessed His 
son: "This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased." 

A VOICE FROM HEAVEN. 

These thousands took the tidings all over the country, and the 
voice had reached Nazareth, that Christ had been baptized by John 
in Jordan, and that there came down a voice from heaven saying, 
""This is my beloved son, hear him." When He arrived at Naza- 
reth there was no small assemblage ready to meet Him. He went 
into the synagogue, as was His custom, and He stood up and read 
the prophecy of the prophet Esaias, and He opened the book to 
read — they did not have books like those we have, they used to have 
parchment — He might have turned to the first chapter, " But Israel 
doth not know Me." He might have read not that, but " from the 
sole of the foot, even unto the head, there is no soundness in it." 
He passed by the 35th chapter — " Then the eyes of the blind shall 
be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped." 

He might have read that but Calvary had got to have a victory 
before that could be said: He passed over the 9th chapter, he 
passed over the 40th chapter. He might have told them — he might 
have turned to the 55th chapter. He had not been wounded, he 
had not yet gone through Gethsemane. But we read that he found 
the place where it is written, " The spirit of the Lord is upon me, 
because He hath anointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor." 
And that was the commencement of His ministry, and that was on 
His going back to Nazareth. And in that 61st chapter of Isaiah 
He stopped, right in the middle of a sentence. There were seven 
things He had come to do. He read that part which was that He 
had come to preach the Gospel to the poor. The next was, " He 
hath sent Me to heal the broken-hearted." Wasn't that good 
tidings ? You would think that was good tidings, wouldn't you ? 

The next was He had come to proclaim liberty to the captives, 
and the next was the recovery of sight to the blind, and to set at 



"THE GOSPEL." 421 

liberty them that are bruised, and to open the doors to the captive, 
and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and He closed the 
book. And the eyes of the whole congregation were upon Him. 
The next sentence, which He omitted, was, " The day of vengeance 
is at hand." I have an idea when the Prophet Isaiah wrote those 
words he did not fully see the first and second coming of Christ, 
that has already passed, and the day of vengeance has not come. 
So it seems as if the Prophet Isaiah did not see the first and second 
coming of our Lord. 

Christ shut up the book ; He will come back by and by and 
He will open the book, and He will commence to read where He 
left off. You can cry for mercy then, but the door will be shut. 
But Christ did not come to condemn sinners. He came to save 
them. I have not come to this city to preach " The day of ven- 
geance is at hand." I have come to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus 
Christ. 

WHY CHRIST CAME INTO THE WORLD. 

I have come to tell you the good tidings. Christ did not come 
into the world to condemn the world, but that through Him the 
world might be saved. In the 9th chapter of Luke you will read that 
He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and 
authority over devils and to heal the sick ; that is what He came 
for — to preach the Gospel of God. And to heal the sick. Then in 
the next chapter He calls around Him the seventy — He had ap- 
pointed other seventy, also, and He sent them, two and two, before 
His face intc every city and place whither He Himself would come. 
Now we find that He had come into the world just to bring glad 
tidings. Did you ever see or hear of any one that didn't like to 
receive glad tidings ? Now one proof that people don't believe the 
Bible is when they wear long faces, as if they had accepted an invi- 
tation to an execution. That ain't the Gospel. 

The Gospel is good tidings of great j oy which shall be to all 
people, "for unto us is born this day in the city of David a 
Saviour." I don't believe that better news ever fell upon the ears 
of mortal man than the news of the Gospel. I don't believe any 



422 "THE GOSPEL." 

man ever heard better tidings, and it is glad tidings of heaven. 
God never had bnt one Son, and He called Him to send that good 
news : " The spirit of the Lord is upon me because He hath 
anointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor." We find that 
Moses was anointed. He went down into Egypt and death fol- 
lowed. When he was opposed, look at the plagues that fell upon 
the Egyptians. We find that the Spirit of God was upon Elijah. 
When he wanted to protect himself, men lost their lives. The 
fifty came to get Elisha, and he called fire down from heaven, and 
he was taken up to heaven. 

HEROES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

The spirit came down upon Gideon, and when men came out 
to meet him he slew them by thousands. The Spirit of God came 
upon Samson and he slew men by thousands. The spirit came 
upon the holy men of old, but when Christ comes, He says, " the 
spirit of the Lord is upon me " — not to take men's lives — the only 
man that lost anything was the man that lost his ear. Peter's 
faith got lukewarm, and he cut off a servant's ear, but the Lord 
gave it back to him. I don't suppose he lost it more than five 
minutes, and it was just as good as ever when he got it back. I 
don't suppose you could find a scar there. 

Christ says, " I did not come to destroy men's lives. I came 
to save them." And it seems to me to be the greatest madness 
that the world don't receive Christ. That we should have to coax 
and to entreat men to receive Christ, isn't it a mystery ? Suppose 
while I am preaching, suppose a messenger should come in and 
bring a letter that brought good tidings to that mother ? Don't 
you suppose she would be glad to receive it. Suppose it told her 
that her boy who has been gone for ten years has returned. He 
ran away ten years ago, and the messenger comes in and states 
that he that ran away has got home. Don't you think that mother's 
face would light up ? I could see it in her countenance, and so 
when I preach the Gospel I can't help but see those that believe. 
It lights up their faces. 

Look at our churches, how the people throng to them to hear 



"THE GOSPEL." 423 

the Gospel. Let a man preach about something else than the 
Gospel, and see if the people would throng to them. There is a 
void in every one's heart that will never be filled until they receive 
the Gospel of Christ. 

Now I want to tell you why I like the Gospel, for I don't 
believe God calls on us to believe the Gospel without giving us 
good reason ; and I don't believe He would call it good news unless 
He gave us a reason. Now it has taken out of my path four of 
the most bitter enemies I had. The 15th chapter of Corinthians 
tells us that the last enemy that shall be destroyed shall be death. 
I see by the badges of mourning among you that many of you 
have lost loved ones. Many of you know what it is to have death 
come to your door when some loved child has been taken from 
your bosom. 

HOW TO OVERCOME DEATH. 

Now I don't know but some of you will say, " If a person is 
afraid of death, he is a coward." I don't believe there is a man or 
woman that ever lived who is not afraid of death unless they knew 
that Jesus Christ would orercome death. Before I knew the Son 
of God as my Saviour death was a terrible enemy to me. Now 
up in that little New England village where I came from, in that 
little village it was the custom to toll the bell whenever any one 
died, and to toll one stroke for every year. Sometimes they would 
toll seventy strokes for a man of seventy, or forty strokes for a 
man of forty. I used to think when they died at seventy and 
sometimes at eighty, well, that is a good ways off. But sometimes 
it would be a child at my age, and then it used to be very solemn. 
Sometimes I could not bear to sleep in a room alone. 

Death used to trouble me, but, thanks to God, it don't trouble 
me now. If He should send His messenger, and the messenger 
should come up here on this platform and say to me, " Mr. Moody, 
your hour is come, I have got to take you away," it would be joy- 
ful news for me ; for though I should be absent from the body, I 
should be present with the Lord. Through the world I can shout, 
" O death, where is thy sting ? " And I hear the voice, I hear the 



424 "THE GOSPEL." 

voice — buried in the bosom of the Son of God. That is what Cal- 
vary means. The wages of sin is death, but He took the wages 
Himself. That is the Gospel of the Son of God, and there is no 
fear for them who believe in Christ Jesus. 

There was Paul ; he had got virtually over death. Let death 
come — " O death, where is thy sting ? " Sometimes I used to go 
into a graveyard, when some one was about to lie down in that 
narrow house, and when the sexton would shovel and throw dirt in 
on the coffin, it would be like a death-knell to my soul. I would 
hear him say, " Dust to dust, ashes to ashes." Now I can measure 
its depths. I can shout as Paul did ; I can say, " O death, where 
is thy sting?" But this soul of man shall go into the house not 
made with hands eternal in the heavens. O the grave is lost in 
victory. It is lost in Christ. 

"THEY SHALL RISE AGAIN." 

O the blessed Gospel of the Son of God, what can we do 
without it ? When we lay our little children away in death they 
shall rise again. I was going into a cemetery once, and over the 
entrance I saw these words : " They shall rise again." Infidelity 
didn't teach that ; we got that from this book. O the blessed Gos- 
pel of the Son of God ! How every one of you ought to believe it! 
Young lady, if you have been careless up to this afternoon, O may 
you get awake. May you this hour not hesitate to turn from your 
sins unto God and believe the Gospel of His Son. I used to be a 
good deal troubled with my sins, and I thought of the day of judg- 
ment, when all the sins that I had committed in secret should blaze 
out before the assembled universe. 

But when a man comes to Christ the Gospel tells him they are 
all gone, and in Jesus Christ he is a new creature. All I know is 
that out of the love which my Lord has for me He has taken all 
my sins and cast them behind His back. That is, behind God's 
back. How is Satan to get at it ? If God has forgiven our sins, 
they won't be mentioned. In Ezekiel we are told not one of them 
shall be mentioned. Isn't it a glorious thing to have all our sins 
blotted out ? And there is another thought, and that is the judg- 



"THE GOSPEL." 425 

meut. You know if a man has committed some great crime, when 
he is to be brought into judgment how he dreads it ! How he dreads 
that day when he is to be brought into court, when he is put into 
a box and witnesses are to come up and testify against him, and he 
is there to be judged. 

But, my friends, the Gospel tells us that if we come to Christ, 
we shall never come into judgment. Why ? Because Christ was 
judged for us. He was wounded for our trangressions. If He has 
been wounded for us, we haven't got to be wounded. " Verily, 
verily," — which means truly, truly — "I say unto you" — now just 
put your name in there — "He that heareth my words, and believeth 
on Him that sent me, hath" — h-a-t-h, hath. It don't say you shall 
have when you die. It says, hath — " He that heareth my words and 
believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not 
come into condemnation." That means into judgment. He sha'n't 
come into judgment, but is passed "from death into life." There 
is judgment out of the way. He shall never come into judgment. 
Why? Because God has forgiven us and given us eternal life. 
That is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Ought people to be gloomy 
and put on long faces when that is the news ? 

FIGHTING FIRE WITH FIRE. 

Away out on the frontier of our country, out on the prairies, 
where men sometimes go to hunt or for other purposes, the grass 
in the dry seasons sometimes catches fire, and you will see the 
flames uprise twenty or thirty feet high, and you will see those 
flames rolling over the western desert faster than any fleet horse 
can run. Now what do the men do ? They know it is sure death 
unless they can make some escape. They would try to run away 
perhaps if they had fleet horses. But they can't, that fire goes 
faster than the fleetest horse can run. What do they do? Why, 
they just take a match and they light the grass from it, and away 
it burns, and then they get into that burnt district. The fire comes 
on, and there they stand perfectly secure. There they stand per- 
fectly secure — nothing to fear. Why? Because the fire has 
burned all there is to burn. 



426 "THE GOSPEL." 

Take your stand there on Mount Calvary. The Gospel of 
Jesus Christ is to whosoever will come. I thank God that I can 
come to this city with a Gospel that is free to all. It is free to the 
most abandoned. Still it may be there are some wives that have 
got discouraged and disheartened. I can tell you the joyful news 
that your husband and your sons have not gone so far but that the 
grace of God can save them. The son of God came to raise up 
the most abandoned. 

FOR TRAMPS AS WELL AS EARTH'S GREAT ONES. 

I noticed on my way down this morning, not less than four or 
five tramps. They look weary and tired. I suppose they had 
slept on the sidewalk last night. I thought I would like to have 
time just to stop and tell them about the Son of God, and how 
Christ loved them. The Gospel of the Son of God is to tell us how 
He loves us. He takes our feet out of the pit and He puts our 
feet on to the Rock of Ages. And that, my dear friends, is what 
Christ wants to do, and don't think that there isn't some one in 
your homes but that He wants to save. Tell them there is none 
too abandoned, none so young, none so fallen, but that God can 
save them. 

There was William Dorset, and the power of the Lord was 
upon him, and in closing his meeting one night, he said there 
wasn't a man in London so far gone but that the Lord could save 
him. There was Whitfield, and the Spirit of the Lord was upon 
him, and he said, "God is so anxious to save souls that He will 
take the devil's castaways." Whitfield said that the Lord would 
take the devil's castaway. Dorset said there was no man in Lon- 
don so far gone but that the Lord would save him. There was a 
lady missionary whom I knew, who found a man who said there 
was no hope for him; he had sinned away his day of grace. She 
went to Mr. Dorset and said to him, "Mr. Dorset, will you go down 
and see him and tell him what you said ? " Mr. Dorset said he 
would be glad to go and see him. 

He went up into a five-story house, and away up in the garret 
he found a young man lying upon some straw. He bent over him 



"THE GOSPEL." 427 

and whispered into his ear and called him his friend. The young 
man looked startled. He says, " You are mistaken in the person 
when you say, 'My friend.' I have got no friends. No one cares 
for me." Mr. Dorset told him that Christ was as much his friend 
as of any man in London. Poor prodigal ! And after he had 
talked with him for some time, he prayed with him, and then he 
read to him out of the Bible, and at last the light of the Gospel 
began to break in upon that darkened heart. 

SOUGHT HIS FATHER'S FORGIVENESS. 

This young man said to Mr. Dorset he thought he could die 
happy if he knew his father was willing to forgive him. Mr. 
Dorset said to him, " Where does your father live? " The young 
man said he lived in the West End of London. Mr. Dorset said, 
" I will go and see him, and see if he won't forgive you." But the 
young man said, " No, I don't want to have you do that. My 
father would abuse you if you should speak to him about me. He 
don't recognize me as his boy any more." Mr. Dorset said, " I will 
go and see him." He went up to the West End of London, where 
he found a very fine mansion, and a servant dressed in livery came 
to the door, and he was ushered into the drawing-room, and pres- 
ently the father, a bright, majestic-looking man, came into the 
room. 

Mr. Dorset held out his hand to shake hands with him, and 
said, "You have a son by the name of Joseph, have you not?" 
And when the father heard that, he refused to shake hands with 
him, and was going out of the room. The father said, " If you 
have come up here to talk about that worthless vagabond, I want 
you to leave the house. He is no son of mine." Mr. Dorset said, 
"He is yours now, but he won't be long; but he is yours now." 
" Is Joseph sick?" said the man. " Yes," said Mr. Dorset, "he is 
dying. I haven't come for money. I will see that he has a decent 
burial. I have only come to ask you to forgive him ?" " Forgive 
him! forgive him!" said the father, "I would have forgiven him 
long ago if I thought he wanted me to. Do you know where he 
is?" " Yes, sir, he is in the East End of London." " Can you 
take me to him?" "Yes, sir, I will take you to him." 



428 "THE GOSPEL." 

And the father ordered out his carriage, and he was on his 
way. When he got there he said, "Did you find my boy here I 
Oh, if I had known he wanted me to, I would have taken him 
home long ago." When the father went into that room he could 
hardly recognize his long-lost boy. The father went over and 
kissed the boy, and the father says, " I would have forgiven you 
long, long ago, if I had known you wanted me to. Let my ser- 
vant order the carriage and take you home." But the boy said, 
( ' No father, I am dying ; but I can die now happ}^ in this garret, 
that I know you are willing to forgive me." And he told his father 
how Jesus had received him, and in a little while he breathed his 
last, and out of that dark garret he rose up into the Kingdom of 
God. Oh, my friends, there may be some one in this city who would 
rejoice to hear such words. Oh, here is a Christian, shall he not 
publish it ? And you that are not Christians, won't you come into 
the kingdom ? Oh, that to-day you may receive Christ is the prayer, 
I believe, of the hundreds that are gathered here. 

WHY HE REPEATED HIS SERMON. 

We don't want to get over that word " Gospel " too soon. It is 
too precious. And I don't know but it would be well to preach the 
same thing over and over again here, until you believe it. I heard 
of a minister who preached the same sermon three times, and some 
of the brethren went to him, and told him he had better preach 
another sermon, and he said when his congregation believed that, 
he would preach another sermon, but he didn't propose to do so 
until they did. 

"The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed 
me to preach the Gospel." Now, the question is, whom shall the 
Gospel be preached to ? There is a certain class of people who 
seem to think the Gospel is very good for drunkards and thieves 
and vagabonds, but there are so many of these self-righteous Phari- 
sees to-day who are drawing their filthy rags of self-righteousness 
around them and thinking the Bible is for a certain class. If I 
understand the Bible correctly, the Gospel is for all. We read in 
the last chapter of Mark — almost the last words the Son of God 



"THE CxOSPEL." 429 

littered on this earth were to His disciples — u Go ye into all the 
world and preach the Gospel to every creature." 

When we come to the Gospel, there is no distinction ; rich and 
poor must be served alike ; learned and unlearned ; all have to 
come into the Kingdom of God one way, and that is by believing 
the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Now these words were uttered after 
Christ had tasted death for every man. Gethsemane now was be- 
hind Him ; Calvary, with all its horrors, was past; He was just 
ready to go home to take His seat at the right hand of the Father; 
He was just giving the disciples His parting message. In other 
words, He was giving them His commission to go into all the world 
and preach the Gospel to every creature. "And he that believeth 
and is baptized shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be 
damned." 

A TEARFUL SCENE. 

I can just imagine all that little band of disciples who stood 
around Him, those unlearned men of Galilee, those fishermen who 
had been associated with Him for three years— I can imagine the 
tears trickling down their cheeks as He talked of leaving them, 
and one of them thinking that the Lord didn't really mean that, 
that He didn't mean they should preach the Gospel to every crea- 
ture — for He had hard work to make them believe that the Gospel 
should be preached to the Gentiles. It seemed as if the Jews 
wanted to keep the Gospel in Palestine ; but by the grace of God 
it would flow out ; it would go to the world because He had given 
orders that the Gospel should be preached to every creature. 

And now we find the messengers going to the four corners of 
the earth to proclaim the glad tidings of the Gospel of Christ. But 
I can imagine that Peter says : " Lord, you don't really mean that 
we shall preach the Gospel to those men that murdered you, to 
those men that took your life?" "Yes," says the Lord, " go and 
preach the Gospel to those Jerusalem sinners." I can imagine 
Him saying : " Go and hunt up that man that put the cruel crown 
of thorns upon My brow, and preach the Gospel to him. Tell him 
he shall have a crown in My kingdom without a thorn in it. He 



430 "THE GOSPEL." 

may sit upon My throne if he will accept of salvation as a gift. 
Go hunt up that man that spat in my face, and preach the Gospel 
to him and offer him salvation, and tell him he can be saved if he 
is only cleansed by the blood I have shed at Calvary. Go to the 
man that thrust the spear into My side and tell him there is a way. 
Tell him there is nothing but love in My heart for him. Go preach 
the Gospel to every creature." 

And after He had gone up on high, we find the Holy Ghost 
came down upon the tenth day, and then they began to preach, 
and now see Peter, standing there upon the day of Pentecost and 
preaching the Gospel of God to sinners ; and John Bunyan says, 
"If a Jerusalem sinner can be saved there is hope for us all." Do 
you think God is mocking ? Do you think God is preaching to 
you and then not giving you the power to take it ? The Gospel 
is preached to every creature, and do you think He is not willing 
that every creature shall be saved on the face of the earth ? 

THE GOSPEL FOR EVERYBODY. 

Now, I like to proclaim the Gospel, because it is to be pro- 
claimed to all. When I see a poor drunkard, when I see a thief, 
when I see a prisoner in yonder prison, it is a grand, glorious 
thing, to go and proclaim to him the glad tidings, because I know 
he can be saved. There is not one that has gone so far or fallen 
so low but that he can be saved; because every one of God's 
proclamations are headed "whosoever." That takes in all; nobody 
is left out. Somebody said he had rather have "whosoever" than 
his name, because he would be afraid it was some other man who 
might have had his name. 

This was well brought out in a prison the other day, when the 
chaplain said to me, "I want to tell you a scene that occurred here 
some time ago. Our Commissioners went to the Governor of the 
State and got him to give his consent to pardon out five men for 
good behavior. The Governor said the record was to be kept in 
secret; the men were to know nothing about it, and at the end of 
six months the men were brought out, the roll was called, and the 
President of the Commission came up and spoke to them; then 



"THE GOSPEL." 431 

putting his hands in his pocket he drew out the papers and said to 
those noo convicts, 'I hold in my hand pardons for five men.' I 
never witnessed anything like it. Every man held his breath and 
it was as silent as death. 

"Then the Commissioners went on to tell how they got these 
pardons; how it was the Governor had given them," and the chap- 
lain said the suspense was so great that he spoke up to the Com- 
missioner and told him to first read the names of those pardoned 
before he spoke further, and the first name read out was " Reuben 
Johnson will come out and get his pardon." He held out the 
paper, but no one came. He looked all around, expecting to see a 
man spring to his feet at once ; still no one arose, and he turned to 
the officer of the prison and said: "Are all the convicts here?" 
"Yes," was the reply. "Then, Reuben Johnson will come and get 
his pardon." 

TRYING TO FIND REUBEN JOHNSON. 

The real Reuben Johnson was all this time looking around to 
see where Reuben was; and the chaplain beckoned to him, and he 
turned and looked around and behind him, thinking some other 
man must be meant. A second time he beckoned to Reuben, and 
called to him, and a second time the man looked around to see 
where Reuben was, until at last the chaplain said to him, "You 
are the man, Reuben;" and he got up out of his seat and sank 
back again, thinking it could not be true. He had been there for 
nineteen years, having been placed there for life, and when he 
came up and took his pardon he could hardly believe his eyes, and 
he went back to his seat and wept like a child ; and then, when 
the convicts were marched back to their cells, Reuben had been so 
long in the habit of falling into line and taking the lock-step with 
the rest that he fell into his place, and the chaplain had to say, 
"Reuben, come out; you are a free man." 

That is the way men make out their pardon — for good be- 
havior; but the Gospel of Jesus Christ is offered to those that have 
not behaved well. It is offered to all that have sinned and are not 
worthy. All a man has got to prove now is that he is not worthy 



432 "THE GOSPEL.' ' 

and I will show him that Christ died for him. Christ died for us 
while we were yet in sin. 

While we were in London, Mr. Spurgeon one day took Mr. 
Sanky and myself to his orphan as3?lum, and he was telling about 
them — that some of them had aunts and some cousins, and that 
every boy had some friend that took an interest in him, and came 
to see him and gave him a little pocket money, and one day he said 
while he stood there a little boy came up to him and said, "Mr. 
Spurgeon, let me speak to you," and the boy sat down between 
Mr. Spurgeon and the elder who was with the clergyman and said. 
"Mr. Spurgeon, suppose your father and mother were dead, and 
you didn't have any cousins, or aunts, or uncles, or friends to come 
to give you pocket money and give you presents, don't you think 
you would feel bad — because that's me ! " Said Mr. Spurgeon, 
"The minute he asked that, I put my right hand down into my 
pocket and took out the money." Because that's me ! And so with 
the Gospel : we must say to those who have sinned, the Gospel is 
offered to them. 

WILLING TO CONFESS MISTAKES. 

As I was talking last night in the inquiry-room, a man tried 
to tell me that he had made many mistakes, but had committed no 
sins. They were all mistakes instead of sins. Better call things 
by their right names. We have all sinned. There is no righteous- 
ness, and there is no man that has walked the streets that has not 
broken the law of God. Therefore all need a Saviour, and there is 
no chance of our being saved, no hope of man being saved, unless 
he will admit first that he has sinned and is lost. Of course if a 
man has not sinned he won't need a Saviour, but it is just because 
we have sinned that we need the Gospel. 

Now, as I stated last night, the Gospel is the very best tidings 
that can come to us. Christ comes to bless us. In Glasgow they 
were telling me of a scene that occureed when Dr. Arnot was 
preaching there. A woman was in great distress about her rent. 
She could not pay it, and so he took some money, and went around 
to the house, — went to the door and knocked. He listened, and 



"THE GOSPEL." 4§3 

thought lie heard the foot-steps of some one inside, and so he 
knocked louder. No one came, and he knocked still louder, but 
after waiting some time he went away disappointed. 

A few days afterward he met this lady on the street at Glas- 
gow and told her that he heard she had been in great distress and 
he went around to help her, and the woman threw up both hands 
and said, "Why, Doctor, that was not you, was it? I was in the 
house all the time, and I thought it was the landlord coming 
around to get the rent, and I kept the door bolted." Now, Christ 
comes to bless. He don't come to demand. He don't come to ask 
you to do something that you cannot do. He comes to bless you. 
When He commenced His Sermon on the Mount, what did He say? 
"Blessed! blessed! blessed!" When He got ready to go back to 
heaven, He raised His hands over that little company and breathed 
upon them blessings. 

A PRESENT OFFER. 

And so, my friends, He comes into this building to-night to 
bless you ; to help you ; He offers to be your salvation ; He offers 
to pay all the debt you owe. You owe God a debt you cannot pay. 
Can you forget this ? You have, broken the law of God. What 
are you going to do with the sins you have committed ? 

What is your hope ? Why there is no hope unless the Lord 
Jesus Christ blots out your sins with His own body, unless Christ 
pays the penalty. If Christ settles the claim, why the claim is 
settled for all time. And that is the doctrine of the Bible, the 
glorious doctrine of substitution. Christ paid the penalty, Christ 
died in our stead. There was a man converted in Europe several 
years ago, and he liked the Gospel so well, he thought he would 
like to go and publish it. Well, he started out to publish it, and 
great crowds came to hear him out of curiosity, just as a great 
many come here out of curiosity, to hear the singing or something 
of that kind. Well, they came to hear him. The man wasn't 
much of a speaker, so the next night there wasn't many there, and 
the third night the man didn't get a hearer. 

But he was anxious to publish the Gospel, and so he got some 

28 



434 "THE GOSPEL." 

great placards and posted them all over the town, that if there was 
any man in that town that was in debt, to come to his office between 
certain hours on a certain day with the proof of their indebted- 
ness, and he would pay the debt. Well, of course, it went all over 
the town, but the people didn't believe him. One man said to his 
neighbor, "John, do you believe this man will pay our debts?" 

11 Oh, of course, not ; that is a great sell ; that is a hoax." The day 
came, and instead of there being a great rush, there didn't any- 
body come. 

Now, it is a great wonder that there isn't a great rush of men 
into the Kingdom of God to have their debts paid when a man can 
be saved for nothing. About 10 o'clock there was a man walking 
in front of the office ; he looked this way and that to see if there 
was anybody looking, and by and by he was satisfied there 
wasn't anybody looking, and he slipped in, and he said, " I saw a 
notice around town if any one would call here at a certain hour you 
would pay their debt. Is there any truth in it ?" " Yes," says 
the man, "it is quite true. Did you bring around the necessary 
papers?" "Yes." 

TOO LATE TO HAVE DEBTS PAID. 

And after the man had paid the debt he said, "Sit down, I want 
talk to you," and he kept him there until 12 o'clock. And before 

12 o'clock had passed there were two more came in and had their 
debts paid. At 12 o'clock he let them all out, when they found 
some other men standing around the door, and they said, " Well, 
you found he was willing to pay your debts, didn't you ?" Yes, they 
said, it was quite true that he had paid their debts. " O, if this is 
so, we are going to get our debts paid." And they went in, but it 
was too late. The man said if they had called within a certain 
hour he would have paid their debts. 

To every one of you that is a bankrupt sinner — and you never 
saw a sinner in the world but that he was a bankrupt sinner — 
Christ comes and he says, "I will pay the debt." And that is just 
what he wants to do to-night. Bear in mind that the Son of 
God came into the world to save sinners, and He has got the power 



''THE GOSPEL." 435 

to forgive sin. And He lias not only got the power, but he is will- 
ing to save, and He is anxious to save ; and so, my friends, if you 
will accept Christ's offer you can get out of this hall to-night 
cleansed of all sin. 

Now the question comes, "Who will accept Him ?" But I can 
imagine there is a man down in the audience who will say, "Well, 
I don't think a man can be saved so easy. I don't believe in these 
sudden conversions. I don't believe a man can come in here and 
be saved at once." What is it God has got ? Is it a gift? Now 
we read in the 6th chapter of Romans, it is a gift : " The wages of 
sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ 
our Lord." Now, if a man is saved, there must be one minute when 
he has not got the gift, and there must be another minute when he 
has it. 

And that is what it is represented in the Bible. It is a gift. 
" Well," some one says, " haven't I got to feel something before I 
can be saved ? How much have I got to give up ?" Give up your 
sins? No, 3^ou have never to give them up, for if you just take 
Christ they will go of themselves. They will all flee away in the 
dim past. But you can't do it of yourself. I tried for a long time 
to give up my sins of myself, and I couldn't do it. But the moment 
I took Christ He snapped the cords, and I have been rejoicing these 
twenty years. And the way to be saved is not to delay, but to come 
and take. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

Address to Christian Workers. 

¥OU remember the first week we were here, we were talking 
about works. We are about ready to go away, and we want 
to bring that subject before you again — the subject of works. 
Of course, I am talking now to those who think they have been saved. 
Those who have been here some of the time during the past ten 
weeks understand that I do not wish to try to stir up men to work 
for God until they are first saved, until they have first accepted 
salvation as a gift. A man cannot work his way into heaven, a 
man cannot do anything to please God even, until he has first be- 
lieved in Christ, and accepted salvation through Him. 

Let me read from the 2d chapter of Galatians, 16th verse : 
" Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but 
by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, 
that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the 
works of the law, for by the works of the law shall no flesh be 
justified.'' Then that verse in the 4th of Romans: "Now to him 
that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt." 
But after we are saved we cannot help going to work. If a man 
tells me he has been saved of Christ, and yet has no desire to work 
for God, I know it is a spurious conversion; it is not a true salva- 
tion ; it has not got the ring of heaven in it. 

The first words that fell from the lips of Christ on earth were, 
" For wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business ?" 
You will find, too, that during His ministry He toiled early and 
late in the work. A man may say he has faith, but if he has not 
works he has only a dead faith. You cannot have faith without 
works ; you cannot have fire without heat. Do not let these men 
that are not willing to lift there little fingers to help God's cause — 
do not let them think they are going to heaven only because they 
have a pew in church, and criticise the minister, and if a minister 
436 



ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. A:\l 

touches their conscience in any guilty spot they want to get a new 
one — that minister does not suit them ! Those men are deceiving 
themselves. If a man has not got a spirit of work, he has not got 
the spirit of Christ or righteousness. The mind of a man that 
has been born of God is not in that man. 

In the 16th chapter of John it says, " I am the vine, ye are the 
branches. He that abideth in me and I in him, the same bringeth 
forth much fruit ; for without me ye can do nothing." There are 
one or two things in this chapter I would call your attention to. It 
says " fruit," "more fruit" and "much fruit" — three kinds; there 
is another, "no fruit." I believe there is a good of pruning that 
would not have to be done to us if we abided in Christ. "He that 
abideth in Christ bringeth forth much fruit." But we fall off and 
are fickle and need pruning, so then the knife must be put in. 

THE VINES MUST BE PRUNED. 

This time of the year the gardener is clipping his fruit trees 
if he wants them to bear. So God has to prune us. Instead of 
our murmuring and complaining about it, we ought to go to work 
to put forth more and more fruit. How many have lost their 
children and afterwards have gone to work earnestly for the first 
time for the Lord ! Before they lost their children, they worked 
and lived wholly for them, spending all their time to accumulate 
money for them. God took their children to Him for their own 
sake, as well as for their parents' sake — to lift them higher. No 
one who has read the Scripture will say that it does no teach us to 
work. 

Every Bible student loves to work. The word of God inspires 
us to work. Paul said the love of Christ constrained him. Jere- 
miah said the Word of God burned in his bones. He fed upon it 
and it was sweet to his taste. If a man gets his heart full of the 
Word of God, he is not then interested just in one little corner of 
the vineyard, but he will take a wide field of labor and interest. 
He will rejoice to hear of a conversion, in any and every part of 
the world. He will be glad to hear of God's work among all denom- 
inations of Christians, among Baptists, among Methodists ; among 



438 ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 

Presbyterians. The moment be hears the Word of God taught, he 
comes ont of the sectarian world, and is interested to have the 
cause of God advanced in all parts of the world. His interest is 
not confined to the prosperity of his own little sect, but it goes out 
toward every good work. 

DON'T WAIT UNTIL PEOPLE GET SICK. 

A man was taken sick, and while he lay there, some one sent 
him a bunch of flowers. He said if he had known how much good it 
would do to a sick man, he would have sent some when he was well. 
A great many do not know how much good they can do until they 
have been tried, and have been tried to their sorrow. If we will 
look around us day after day we will find many a good thing to do. 
We ought to pray every day that we may wipe away the tears of 
suffering from some one's face that very day. If we are going to 
help the poor widow and fatherless children, we must do it now. 

God has sent us here to make the world brighter and better, 
and to help those that carry burdens. Some one said the world 
seemed like two mauntains, a mountain of joy and a mountain of 
sorrow, and if every day we can take a little from the mountain of 
sorrow to the mountain of joy we might be better and do better. 
"He that waters, himself shall be watered." Every one of us 
should study how we can be a blessing to others. Those of you 
who are going round with your hearts sad and cast down, if you go 
to work and try to help others, then your burdens will be gone and 
the light will shine in your souls. 

In the 2d chapter of Titus, 14th verse, it says: " Who gave 
Himself for us that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and 
purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of all good works." 
I think we do not like to be considered, peculiar. We are very 
much afraid of that. We want to be like the world, and mingle 
with the world, and try to be like the world, so that people won't 
consider us peculiar. People do not like that. I hear people say 
sometimes, " Yes she is a good woman, but " — with a shrug or a 
grimace — "she is very peculiar," " Yes ; a very good man — yes, 
oh yes, but very peculiar." 



ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 439 

I would just like to make one journey round the world to see 
if I could not find one church made up of peculiar people. That 
church would shake the whole world. That is what we want — 
peculiarity. Christ taught us that He will make us a peculiar 
people, zealous of all good works. The very thing we do not like 
is the very thing we want to-day. Elijah was the most peculiar 
man of his day, but he was worth more than all those one hundred 
thousand people around him. He held the keys of heaven. He 
could stand before Ahab and his whole court, aud all his false 
prophets. God was with him. 

"A GOOD MAN, BUT VERY PECULIAR." 

Enoch was the most peculiar man that lived in his day. I 
suppose they all pointed to him and said, "Yes, yes, a good man, 
but very peculiar — different from other people." Daniel was the 
most peculiar man Babylon ever had. If we could only have a few 
peculiar people now in this city we would see wonderful results. 
If God has a great work to do, He will call some peculiar man to 
do it. A man that sets his back upon the world, and sets his face 
like a flint towards heaven, is a man that is peculiar, and God can 
use him and speak through him. 

The great trouble is with many that we don't get ourselves 
out of sight. We ought to let the name of Christ be kept in 
sight, and ever watch for Him, and then we are ready to work for 
the Lord in any position. Now turn to Titus, iii. 8 : " This is a 
faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, 
that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain 
good works. These things are good and profitable unto men." 
Now, if I understand that portion of Scripture, it means that you 
are to be a help to every good work, every good society. Don't 
say, "O God, bless my little field." Is the Tract Society a good 
society? I believe that it is. 

Let us do all we can to keep it up, and I hope the time is 
coming, and I hope I will live to see the day, and I believe I will, 
when these wealthy men will be seeking investments for the Lord 
as they do for themselves. It will do perhaps for these ungodly 



4-10 ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 

men to accumulate these millions, but when a man has been re- 
deemed by the precious blood of the Lamb and is jealous of good 
work I think he ought to be seeking some investments for the 
Lord. Is this society a good society? Then maintain it. Keep 
it up. Look at the societies you have got in this city, that are just 
bleeding at every pore, suffering for the want of money; look at 
the churches saddled with debt. Many men are not willing to get 
into debt themselves, but they will let the Lord's work suffer. 

THE WAY TO ENJOY YOUR DINNER. 

Now, if you want a good appetite and if you want to sleep 
well, if you have got money, I will tell you what to do. Send 
around a check to the American Bible Society for $10,000 ; send 
one to the Tract Society for $10,000 ; send around to this Epis- 
copal brother to pay off the church debt. See how his eyes brighten 
up when I say that. Here are some of these Presbyterian churches 
in the same fix. They would be very glad to have the debt ou 
these churches paid off. They cannot work much for the Lord 
when they are in debt. Then there is the Young Woman's Chris- 
tian Association; they, too, have got a debt and want to work. 
Look at their field — these hundreds and thousands of women in 
this city that mil be led astray, perhaps, and it will not be long 
before their feet will take hold on hell. It is worth more than all 
your preaching if you can onl} T have an institution to throw out a 
warm hand and a beneficent influence. You, ladies of wealth and 
position, say, "I don't see the importance of these things." Of 
course you don't. 

You have got a good mother and father to care for and watch 
over you, but look at the hundreds and thousands of girls that 
have got no father or mother, and who have no wealth and are 
poor, and have to struggle against odds that you know nothing 
about. They ought to be helped, and the strong must help the 
weak., and if you have got lnone}^ go and make good use of it. Go 
and be a sunbeam to cheer up somebody else, and by so doing get 
a blessing in your own soul. Says Paul: "Be careful that you 
maintain good work." Instead of cutting down these missionaries 



ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 441 

in a foreign land, I think it would be better for us to cut off some 
of our own luxury. When a man can drive out with a four-in- 
hand, let him give up two of his horses, and give what he saves 
by it to the foreign mission field, and so with many little luxuries; 
then we can enjoy Christianity a great deal better. 

HARD TIMES ARE THE BEST. 

These hard times are the very best times that could happen to 
the church. I don't believe we would have had such a blessing in 
this city if it had not been for these hard times. When men get 
their millions and hoard them up, I think it is the very best thing 
that can happen to them to have the Lord come and take them 
away, and if a man maintains these good works with his money 
he will never lose it, but lay it up in heaven. 

People say that such a man died worth so many millions. It 
doesn't make any difference how much a man accumulates. He 
can't die worth anything, for he leaves it here. He is not worth a 
penny ; and so, if you want to save your money, lay it up in heaven 
where thieves cannot get hold of it. Make yourselves rich by thus 
investing in these good institutions ; maintain good works ; keep 
your Tract Society, your missions. 

Wouldn't it be a glorious day if, instead of our going around 
begging for money for these institutions, we could just sit in an 
office and have men send checks around. I have got tired and 
sick of going to men and begging for money. I hope the Lord of 
heaven will stir up people so that they will be going around to see 
where they can invest their money. The ministers can tell them, 
for they know, and you that have money ought to consult them as 
to what is the best investment you can make. I want to be rich for 
eternity, not for time. But how blind and short-shighted men are 
that are seeking to be rich just for time. Men accumulate millions 
just to make the way to hell easy for their children. 

It is almost sure ruin for a child to be left in this world with 
with money and nothing to do. You talk about the young ladies 
of this city whom you call so fortunate because they have got all 
the money they want and have nothing to do. It is unfortunate 



442 ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 

I tell you, and they are ruined. I pity them from the bottom of 
my heart. It would be far better if the}' hadn't a penny. Be care- 
ful, says St. Paul, that you maintain good works. It is good advice. 
Let us take it. 

Now what we want is to have men established. I have been 
connected for fifteen years — at least before I started out on this 
preaching tour — with a mission Sabbath-school, and I have noticed 
this, that the teachers who are at the Sabbath-school fifty-two Sun- 
days in the } T ear, are constantly reaping, and those teachers who 
are not constantly established, and are onh- in the Sundy-school 
about six months, and then give up discouraged, and if there is 
something better offered give up their place, the}- never succeed. 
What we want is to be established in every word and work, and let 
us take up this word and work and do it thoroughly, and God's 
word has gone out that we shall reap if we faint not. 

A BROTHER'S DEVOTED SISTER. 

I was very much interested some time ago in a young lady 
that lived in the city. I don't know her hame, or I have forgotten 
it. She was about to go to China as the wife of a missionary on 

his way to some heathen field. She had a large Sabbath-school 
class in the city and succeeded in getting a blessing upon many of 
her scholars through her efforts. She was very anxious to get 
some one who would look after her little flock and take care of 
them while she was gone. She had a brother who was not a Chris- 
tian, and her heart was set on his being converted and taking her 
place as leader of the class. The young man — perhaps he is in 
this audience to-day — refused to accept of Christ, but away in her 
closet alone she pleaded with God that her brother might be con- 
verted and take her place. She wanted to reproduce herself and 
that is what every Christian ought to do — get somebody else con- 
verted to take up your work. 

Well, the last morning came, and around the family altar as the 
moment drew near for the lady's departure, and they did not know 
when thev should see her again, the father broke down, and the 
boy went up stairs. Just before she left for the train the boy came 



ADDRESS TO CHRISTIAN WORKERS. 443 

down, and putting his arms around his sister's neck, said to Her, 
" My dear sister, I will take your Saviour for mine, and I will take 
care of your class for you," and the young man took her class, and 
the last I heard of him he was filling her place. There was a 
young lady established in good work. When she left here she got 
some one to carry it on. 

GO AND WORK IN THE VINEYARD. 

Let me say to you, young converts who have just commenced 
a Christian life — find some work to do for the Master. Go out into 
the vineyard at once and get some work to do. Just persevere, and 
if }^ou don't see the fruit pretty near, and the work don't seem to 
prosper, go right on. Those Christians that get discouraged and 
disheartened, God never uses, and His kingdom is never built up 
through them. What we want is good courage to persevere. 

Turn to Matthew, v. 16 : "Let your light so shine before men 
that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which 
is in heaven." Now the eyes of the whole Christian world are 
upon this city at the present time. They are looking to see just 
what you Christians are going to do, and if the work stops now, 
don't say it will be our fault. My dear friends, it will be your own. 
There has been no false excitement here. We have just preached 
the Gospel. To be sure, we have done it poorly, but it has been 
the same old Gospel. We have just held up Christ to the people, 
and if this work stops, bear in mind that it will be your own fault 
that you have not taken it up and carried it on. 

Thousands in this audience have got just as much ability and 
talent as I have got or as Mr. Sankey has got, if you would only 
use it. 

I want to speak of one thing that has cheered me since coming 
here beyond measure, and that is the spirit of unity. We have 
not heard a word about denominations since I have been here. 
Thanks be to God we are bound up in one bundle, and the moment 
we understand each other a little better we shall be able to do 
greater work, and the hosts of hell will not prevail against us. 




CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Address to Young Converts. 

|Y text this evening is in the 14th chapter of Romans, 4th 
verse, "God is able to make him stand." There are a 
great many lukewarm Christians that are themselves saved 
and yet who really believe in their hearts that these young converts 
won't stand long. Some people will give them six weeks, and 
some six months, and then all will be over. That has been the 
cry ever since I can remember, ever since I have been a Christian. 
I suppose we will hear it to the end of time. Well, there are 
some who do not hold out, but think of the thousands and thou- 
sands that do. "He is able to make us stand;" and if you young 
converts, in the morning of your Christian experience, learn this 
one lesson, it will save you from many a painful hour. Yes, it is 
God that will make you stand. You cannot stand yourself. 

I hear a young convert get up and say, " I am going to hold 
out." That is not the way to put it. You will not unless God lets 
you. He is able to make you stand. He was able to make Joseph 
stand there in Egypt ; He was able to make Elijah stand before 
Ahab ; He was able to make Daniel stand in Babylon. So, my 
friend, you need the same grace and the same power that all these 
did. They have gone on before you. Your strength lies in God, not 
in yourself. The moment you lean on yourself, down you go. The 
moment we get self-contented and think we are able to stand and 
overcome, we are on dangerous territory ; we are standing upon 
the edge of a precipice. When I first became a Christian I thought 
I would be glad when I got farther on, and got established. I 
thought I would be so strong and there would not be any danger ; 
but the longer I live, the more danger I see there is. The only 
hope of any Christian in this house is to keep hold of Christ. We 
may fall after we have been Christians for twenty years ; a good 
many fall at a very old age. 
Mi 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 445 

But though we fall, we are not therefore lost. A man may 
fall and not be lost. Perhaps the old Adam comes uppermost and 
they commit some sin and then get discouraged. It is no sign that 
a person is not a Christian because he falls into sin. He is as 
much a Christian as ever if he repents and hates his sin. If he loves 
his sin and lives in it, he has never been truly converted. If he hates 
the sin and turns away from it, and mourns over it, it is a sign that 
he has been converted. If you fall into sin, do not get discouraged. 
Take it to God and confess it; tell Him all about it. He will 
forgive. 

CAUTION AGAINST SELF-CONFIDENCE. 

I want to guard you against self-confidence ; there is the dan- 
ger. You must keep your eyes open, and not be self-confident. 
Your strength lies in Another, and not in yourself. Take Christ 
as your model, not any other man on the face of the earth ; because 
then, if you do sometimes make mistakes, if you do sometimes fall 
into sin, He will restore you. Just keep your eye fixed upon Him 
and remember all the while that He is able to make you stand. 
When we get into temptation, He is able to make a way for your 
escape, and to deliver you from every temptation. He won't suffer 
you to be tempted more than you can bear. In the second chapter 
of Hebrews and the 18th verse, we read "For in that he himself 
hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succor them that are 
tempted." 

It is encouraging to think He has been in this dark world and 
knows all about its trials and temptations. "He is able to succor 
those that are tempted." When temptation comes, it won't crush 
you ; it won't bear you down. Perhaps the old nature will come up 
in you, but you must look to Him for strength. You know it is 
an old maxim "Don't give up to your impulse." That is not the 
advice I give. I say live right up to your impulse ; live up to all 
the impulse that God gives you. Don't be afraid you are not going 
to have grace enough in the future. That is a mistake. Use all 
the grace that God gives you ; He has plenty ; the more you use, 
the more you'll get ; He is able to succor them that are tempted. 



446 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

About getting discouraged when you sin ; you know they say 
short accounts make long friends. Keep short accounts with God. 
You should see the face of God every morning before you see the 
face of any human being. If you come to the cross every morn- 
ing, you never will get but one day's journey from the cross. You 
must say to yourself, " I want to feed my soul as well as my body 
a breakfast every morning. I want to see the face of God before I 
see the face of any earthly man." Just keep close to the cross, 
and close to Him, and if anything has gone wrong during the day 
or evening, do not sleep until that account has been settled. Take 
it to Christ and tell it right out to Him ; tell Him how you are sorry, 
and ask Him to forgive you. He delights to forgive. That is what 
I mean by keeping a short account with God. 

HOW LITTLES MULTIPLY. 

You know when you go to a grocery store and get a little 
sugar, for instance, every few days, in a short time you will soon 
find that the grocer has a bill against you for ten pounds. You are 
surprised, and you likely say you never had it. You forget how 
much you did get. Perhaps then you quarrel with the grocer, and 
you have a great deal of trouble from it. Perhaps if you kept 
short accounts you would remember what you owed. Keep short 
accounts, or else you won't prosper. If you sin, bear in mind that 
you have an advocate in Jesus Christ. We read in 2d Timothy . 
1st chapter, 12th verse, ''Nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I 
know whom I have believed and I know that he is able to keep 
that which I have committed unto him against that day." A man 
was asked what his persuasion was. He said it was the same as 
Paul's. I don't know what Paul's persuasion was. All persuasions 
claim him. ' ' Verily I am not ashamed, for I know whom I believe, 
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have com- 
mitted to him." That is Paul's persuasion. You may call it what 
you have a mind to, it is a good persuasion. 

If you have really been converted you have committed your 
soul, your body, your reputation, your life, your money, every- 
thing you have, to the Lord. Stick to this text : " He is able to 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 447 

keep that which I have committed to him." If the devil comes and 
tries to make you everything else but a Christian, don't listen to 
him, but just refer him right over to Christ. Tell him you have 
committed your case to Christ. He will take care of your cause ; 
He is able to keep that which you have committed to Him. 

THAT BIG BROTHER. 

A little boy was going home from school one aay and met a 
big fellow who wanted to fight with him. He said " Well, wait 
till I go and fetch my big brother," and he ran off after his big 
brother and away ran the boy. So you tell Satan when he threatens 
to convince you, that you will go after Christ, and let Him settle 
it for you. You are no match for Satan. He is stronger than you 
are ; but Satan flies when you bring Christ. Then you are saved, 
and that is your only refuge. Jesus will be to you an Elder 
Brother. 

A man with whom I was acquainted bought out a certain store. 
Everybody predicted that he would fail. Two or three men had 
failed one after another in the store, with more capital than that 
man had. Well, he went on, and on, and did not fail, and every 
one wondered why he got along so well. By and by it leaked out 
that he nad a rich brother who kept furnishing money, and he 
kept close to him. So if you will only keep close to your Elder 
Brother, He has all the treasures of heaven to place at your dis- 
posal ; He will keep you. There is no trouble about your going 
back to the world if you keep close to Him. 

Men go and put their money in the Bank of England, think- 
ing it the safest bank in the world! But why is it safe ? Because 
every night when it grows dark you will see a whole band of sol- 
diers going to that bank. And they stand around it and guard it 
all night. So are the sentinels of heaven camped around about 
God's own children to guard them. God has legions of angels 
that He can send down to protect us when we call upon Him. Our 
help is in God alone. 

O my friends, when Satan comes to you and tries to lure you 
away, bear in mind that Christ is your keeper, and you are not 



448 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

i 
able to keep yourselves. We want these young converts to go to 
work in God's service. " God is able to make you stand," God 
has grace enough. He wants 3-ou to come up to His throne and 
get all the grace you need to enable } 7 ou to do the work. Now every 
single convert ought to be good for at least a dozen more, and be 
able to win at least twelve other souls to Christ. A convert lately 
gave me a list of names of those whom he had been trying to lead 
to Christ since he was converted. He was converted the 3d of 
February, and he brought me a list of fifty-nine names of persons 
whom he had tried to lead to Christ during that time. 

HASTE TO THE-RESCUE. 

Every young convert ought to be good for a dozen at least. 
If you are rescued you ought to try to rescue others. Every man, 
woman and child who is a Christian should go to work in this 
service. He says, "My grace shall abound that I shall be ready 
for every good work." One day I saw a steel engraving that I 
liked very much. I thought it was the finest thing I ever had 
seen, at the time, and I bought it. It was a picture of a woman 
coming out of the water, and clinging with both arms to the cross. 
There she came out of the drowning waves with both arms around 
the cross perfectly safe. Afterwards I saw another picture that 
spoiled this one for me entirely, it was so much more lovely. It 
was a picture of a person coming out of the dark waters, with one 
arm clinging to the cross and with the other she was lifting some 
one else out of the waves. 

That is what I like. Keep a firm hold upon the cross, but 
always try to rescue another from the drowning. If you are 
rescued, haste to the rescue of some one else. Then you become 
stronger and stronger. Everything you do for Christ makes you 
grow in grace. "He that waters, shall himself be watered." The 
souls of these people that never do anything for Christ, become 
all dried up. It is hard to find any chords running from their 
souls to Him, or to others, because they never try to do anything 
for anybody. 

When I was at Mr. Spurgeon's house, he showed me some 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 449 

pictures of his twin boys. He had had them taken every year since 
they were born and they were then seventeen. Yon look at the 
pictures from year to year, and there is not much difference 
between them; but in the seventeen years there is a great differ- 
ence. So with you young converts ; there is not much difference 
in you from year to year; but as you grow in grace, in the course 
of seventeen years there will be a very great change. You want 
to grow from week to week, from month to month, and from year 
to year steadily, Go you will become stronger in the service of God. 
"God is able to make all grace abound toward you." 

HOW TO SEI.2CT YOUR FRIENDS. 

You should try to learn from those who have been long in the 
Church. If you take my advice you will select your friends from 
experienced Christians. You must keep in the company of people 
who know more than yourself. That's the way I do. Of course 
I get the best of the bargain that way, but that is what you want; 
you can learn something of them and will not be mingling with 
the ungodly and the unconverted. You need not become like 
ungodly people when you happen to be thrown with them; you 
can be in the world and not of it. 

Not only that, but what you want is to get in love with this 
blessed Bible; and the moment you get full of Bible truths, the 
world has lost its power. Then you won't be saying: "Have I 
got to give up this? Have I got to give up that? You never hear 
Bible Christians talk in that way. There are some things I used 
to like to do before I was converted that I don't do now; but thank 
God, I don't want to do them. God has turned my appetite against 
such things. I have been fed upon this blessed Bible, until I have 
no longer any taste for the literature I used to like. 

There are people who talk about killing and say they like to 
read novels to kill time. But a good Christian does not need to do 
that; he never has time enough. Why, if there were forty-eight 
hours instead of twenty-four, in a day and night, we would still 
want more time to work for the Lord. It is only a little while, a 
few days and hours, that we stay here and we have to do all that 

29 



450 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

is given us to do in that short time. No child of God ought to 
talk of killing time. 

I have one rule about books. I do not read any book, unless 
it will help me to understand the book. I want to tell you right 
here, that this is not anything that I have to give up. It is a great 
pleasure to get a book that helps unfold the blessed Bible. It is 
manna to my soul. If you young converts get in love with the 
Bible it will help you wonderfully. I advise you to go into a 
good Bible-class, and to get experienced Christians to help you. 
Go there and learn, and then go out and help teach others, and 
thus you will grow in grace. I want to have you understand one 
thing: that I am in favor of all men and women that love Jesus 
Christ, uniting with some church. 

HOW TO HELP YOUR MINISTER. 

And let me say, if the man who is your minister preaches the 
Gospel, you stand by him, pray for him. What a help it is for a 
man that is preaching to have a lot of people in the pews praying 
for him. Don't go to church just to criticise. Any one can do 
that. If you feel inclined to criticise, just stop and ask yourself 
whether you could do it any better. Some men only make one 
mistake, that of finding imperfections in everybody and everything. 
I have got done looking for perfection in this world. If the minister 
does not preach the Gospel, go out of his church and get into some 
church where the Gospel is preached. I don't care what church it 
is ; but if a man does not preach the Gospel don't go to his church. 

And do not be running from one church to another. Go to one 
church and stand by your minister. If he holds up Christ, 
preaches the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ, stand by him. In 
Romans, 4th chapter and 20th verse, it says, "He staggered not 
at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, 
giving glory to God. And being fully persuaded that what He had 
promised He was able also to perform." 

Now, my friends, bear in mind that God's word is true, and it 
will help you wonderfully when you take up that word of God, to 
realize that every word of it is true. Infidels and skeptics will try 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 451 

to make you think it is not true. When tkey come to me and say 
that, I tell them " Well, if you can get me a better Bible, I will 
give this up, but not until then." But when there is no book that 
will bear any comparison with it or touch it, why should we give it 
up? What has infidelity to give us in the place of it? Bear in 
mind that these promises are all true. " He staggered not at the 
promises of God." Abraham was fully persuaded that God was 
able to do what he had promised to do. 

PROMISES THAT DO NOT FAIL. 

An old man told me that he had marked at all the promises of 
God the letters "P. T."— which stood for " Proved" and "Tried." 
None of the promises of God ever will or can fail. If you feed 
upon these promises you will become rich in grace. There is no 
discount on any word God has ever said. You know when Christ 
was born, it says that Caesar sent out a proclamation that the whole 
world should be taxed, and so Mary was brought to Bethlehem. 
God had said that the child should be born at Nazareth, and it 
could not by any possibility have been born at Jerusalem. That tax 
was not collected for nine years after. The virgin was brought to 
Bethlehem just at that time, that the word of God might be 
fulfilled. "Abraham staggered not at the promises of God." 

Sometimes when our duty seems to promise some very difficult 
and almost impossible thing, people say, " But how is he going to 
do it?" I don't know how, but that is none of your business. A 
colored woman had it about right when she said that if God should 
tell her to jump through a stone wall, she would jump right 
through — that getting through would be God's work and not her's; 
He would see to it if she did what she was told. Take His Word 
as " a lamp to your feet and a light to your path" to guide you 
through this dark world. 

In the 24th verse of Jude it says, " Now unto Him that is 
able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before 
the presence of His glory with exceeding joy." That is one of the 
sweetest verses in the whole Word of God ; not the sweetest — it is 
hard to tell which is the sweetest verse in the Bible. It is like a 



452 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

man that has ten children; he cannot tell which he likes best. 
How precious, how sweet those promises ! Some converts have an 
idea that sometimes they have to fall. Some people think they 
have to get lukewarm sometimes, and wander off into the world. 
You do not get that idea from the Bible. An old man said to 
me once, " I am an old man now, but I never have lost sight of 
Christ since I first became converted." You have not got to fall ; 
do not believe it for a moment. "Unto Him that is able to keep 
you from falling, and to present you faultless before the throne of 
God with exceeding great joy." May all in this assembly from 
this night be so kept from falling, and so presented before the 
throne. 

A REMARKABLE CONTRAST. 

There is an institution in London where they take the poor 
little street Arab in. They take him in and the first thing they do 
is to have his picture taken, just as he looks when they find him, 
in his rags and dirt. Then, after he has grown up there, and has 
had all the benefit of the institution, before he goes they have his 
photograph taken again ; and they give him the two photographs. 
One is to show him how he looked when he came to them, and the 
other, that he may compare them. It would be a good thing if we 
could remember ourselves distinctly as we were when the Lord 
first found us, and compare it with ourselves when He leaves us on 
the hill-tops of glory. 

It says in Deuteronomy: "He found him, He kept him, He 
led him about in the wilderness, and kept him as the apple of His 
eye." The Lord does it all. He fonnd you; you did not find Him. 
People say they are seeking the Lord. The Lord seeks you. It is 
a double seeking. Christ seeks the sinner and the sinner seeks 
Him. It does not take long for an anxious Saviour and an anxious 
sinner to meet. The moment you are ready and willing to belong 
to Christ, He is ready and willing to save you. 

Some people ask me questions about their daily walk and con- 
duct. They say, " I would like to know whether it is right for me 
to go to the theatre?" " I would like to know whether it is right 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 453 

for me to smoke?" or, "to drink moderately?" I cannot carry 
your consciences ; Christ does not lay down rules ; He lays down 
principles. One rule I have had is this : If there is anything I 
am troubled about in my conscience, and am uncertain whether it 
is right or not, I give Christ the benefit of the doubt. It is better 
to be a little too strict than too liberal. And let me say to you 
young converts and you Christians here, the eyes of the world are 
upon you ; they are watching. 

AVOID THE APPEARAJNCE OF EVIL. 

For myself, I could not go to the theatre ; I would not like to 
have in}- children go. I do not do anything myself that I would 
not like to have them do. I could not smoke, because I would not 
w r ant my boy to smoke. I could not read those flashy novels. I 
have no taste for them, no desire to read them ; but if I did I 
would not do it. • But, if you live to please Him, you will not have 
any trouble in these things. He says, " If any man lack wisdom, let 
him call on God ; He will give liberally to all." 

Another rule is : Don't do anything }^ou cannot feel like pray- 
ing over. Once I received an invitation to be at the opening of a 
large billiard hall. I suppose they thought it was a good joke to 
invite me. I went before the time came and asked the man if he 
meant it. He said yes. I asked him if I might bring a friend 
along. He said I might. I said, " If you say or do anything that 
will grieve my friend I may speak to him during your exercises." 
They didn't know what I meant, and knitted their brows and looked 
puzzled. 

At last he asked, "You are not going to pray, are you? We 
never want any praying here." " Well," I said, " I never go where 
I cannot pray; but I'll come round." "No," said he, " we don't 
want you." ' Well, I'll come, anyway, since you invited me," said 
I. But he rather insisted that I shouldn't, and finally I told him : 
"We'll compromise the matter. I won't come if you will let me 
pray with you now." So he agreed to that, and I got down, with 
one rum-seller on each side of me, and prayed that they might fail 
in their business, and never have any more success in it from that 



454 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

day Well, they went on for abont two months, and then, sure 
enough, they failed. God answered prayer that time. 

In Europe in a place where there was a good deal of whiskey 
distilled, one of the men in the business was a church member, 
and got a little anxious in his conscience about his husiness. He 
came and asked me if I thought that a man could not be an houest 
distiller. I said, y^ou should do, whatever yon do, for the glory of 
God. If y T ou can get down and pray r about a barrel of whiskey, 
and say for instance, when y^ou sell it, " O Lord God, let this 
whiskey be blessed to the world," it is probably honest. 

YOUR HIGHEST MOTIVE. 

Do not live to please yourself. Live to please Christ. If you 
cannot do a thing honestly, give it up let the consequences be what 
they may. If you take my advice you will never touch strong 
drink as long as you live. Nearly all the young converts that 
have fallen in Europe have been led into it by that cursed cup. 
Yes, but you say, some of the church members, some of the Chris- 
tians that stand high, drink moderately. Well, don't you touch it 
if they do. Some men have strong wills and can tell where to stop; 
but bear in mind that ninety-nine out of a hundred have not strong 
wills, and your son may be the very next one to go too far. If it 
is not an injury^ to yourselves, give it up for Christ's sake, and for 
the sake of others. 

And y^ou that have once been slaves to it, come out and try to 
rescue others who are still slaves to it. As Dr. Bonner, of Phila- 
delphia, said, " Be sure y^ou do not tarnish the old family- name. 
You have been born into the family of God, and y^ou must sustain 
its high credit." Some of these old families think a good deal of 
their names ; and that is right. A good name is worth more than 
riches. Now that you have become the sons and daughters of God, 
do not disgrace the old famil}^ name. The eyes of the world are 
upon y T ou, walk as the son of a king, as a daughter of heaven, a 
child of God, the world will become better for you, and by your 
walk and conversation you will light others to Christ. 

Turn to the 20th chapter of Acts, 32d verse, " And now breth- 



ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 455 

ren, I commend yon to God, and to the word of his grace, which is 
able to bnild up and to give an inheritance among all them which 
are sanctified." That was Paul's farewell to the Ephesians. O, how 
sweet it is ! " He is able to lift you up." Some of the young con- 
verts have got their Bibles out, I see. That is right. I marked 
that a good many years ago. It has been a great help to me. 
Paul had been three years among them, and had prayed and wept 
over them. If you learn your Bible well you are certain to be 
good Christians. If the word of God is not hid in our hearts, 
how can the Holy Ghost work through us. 

YOU SHOULD GO FORWARD. 

But let me give you a caution. You must not think that you 
may stop right here and spend the rest of your days giving your 
experience. I want to warn you against becoming self-satisfied. 
The moment that young converts come to be wise and to win some 
souls to Christ, Satan comes up and says, u You are getting along 
very well," and " Yes, that is a good act ; an admirable work you 
are doing;" and then they get so puffed up with spiritual pride 
that God cannot use them. 

The next danger is that they may be so afraid they will get 
puffed up, that they don't do anything. We have nothing to be 
proud of, really. Talk about the great work we are doing here. 
We haven't done anything. We ought to hang our heads to-night 
and be ashamed of ourselves, — not ashamed of Christ, but of our- 
selves, — there is a good deal of difference between those two things. 
We have not done anything worth speaking of; there is no chance 
of boasting. Why, if the Christians of this city really did come 
forward and exert themselves, what a time there would be ! Be sure 
you do not get lifted up with spiritual pride. God will punish that ; 
he hates spiritual pride. Satan knows that if he can get us puffed 
up with spiritual pride, it is all he wants ; so he comes up and says, 
" What a glorious light he is. He is one of the brightest lights 
of the church." Look out for spiritual pride, as for one of your 
greatest enemies. 

You have got nothing to be proud of. If you are ever used 



456 ADDRESS TO YOUNG CONVERTS. 

at all, bear in mind that it is God speaking in yon, and not you 
yourself. We do not say that gaspipe gives the light; it only 
conveys it. If we have any light in us, it is Christ's light. Let 
us be careful that we do not fall into that sin of being proud and 
lifted up. That little word " able " — raay it sink down deep into 
your hearts to-night. He is able to do all for you that you need 
to have done; and if you but make up your minds to rely on Him 
you will have strength as you need it. 

It seems as if during the past ten weeks the Lord has won- 
derfully answered prayers, and the tide has risen here until it 
seems very high. Once I was told of a little child who lay dying. 
As its breath grew feeble, she said, "Lift me, papa." And he put 
his hand under the child and lifted her a little ; and then she whis- 
pered " higher," and he raised her higher, and she still said 
"higher," and again "higler, higher," until he lifted her just 
as high as his arms could reach, until at last her Heavenly 
Father lifted her into his Etei nal Kingdom. 

So our prayer ought to be "Higher, higher, nearer my God to 
Christ." Every day we ought to make a day's march toward 
Heaven, and nearer and nearer to Him. 

I do not like these farewell meetings. I want from the depth 
of my heart to bless you for all your kindness to us here. I am 
glad so many have been blessed in their souls. Bear in mind that 
we shall pray for you, and if we do not see you again we shall 
look for you on the morning of the Resurrection. I don't like to 
say good-bye. But I can say, as I once heard Lucius Hart say: 
"I'll bid you all good-night, and I'll meet you in the morning." 
May God bless you all ! 



PART III 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS, 
ANECDOTES AND INCIDENTS. 



SHOW YOUR LIGHT. 

A friend of mine was walking along the streets one dark 

night, when he saw a man coming along with a lantern. As he 

came np close to him, he noticed by the bright light that the man 

had no eyes. He went past him ; bnt the thought struck him, 

M Surely that man is blind ! " He turned around and said, " My 

friend, are you not blind?" "Yes," was the answer. "Then 

what have you got the lantern for ? " " I carry the lantern," said 

the blind man, "that people may not stumble over me." Let us 

take a lesson from that blind man, and hold up our light, burning 

with the clear radiance of heaven, that men may not stumble 

over us. 

FAST TO THE SHORE. 

I once heard of two men who, under the influence of liquor, 

came down one night to where their boat was tied ; they wanted 

to return home, so they got in and began to row. They pulled 

away hard all night, wondering why they never got to the other 

side of the bay. When the grey dawn, of morning broke, behold, 

they had never loosed the mooring line or raised the anchor ! 

And that's just the way with many who are striving to enter the 

kingdom of heaven. They cannot believe, because they are tied 

to this world. Cut the cord ! cut the cord ! Set yourselves free 

from the clogging weight of earthly things, and you will soon go 

on towards heaven. 

LAZY CHRISTIANS. 

A good many people are complaining all the time about them- 
selves, and crying out: "My leanness! my leanness!" when 
they ought rather to say, " My laziness ! my laziness !" 

457 



458 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

THE OLD MISER. 

One of Mr. Moody's favorite stories was about a converted 
miser to whom a neighbor in distress appealed for help. The 
miser decided to prove the genuineness of his conversion by giving 
aim a ham. On his way to get it the tempter whispered : " Give 
him the smallest one you have." A mental struggle ensued, and 
finally the miser took down the largest ham he had. " You are a 
fool," the devil said, and the farmer replied, "If you don't keep 
still I'll give him every ham in the smoke house ! " 

A SKEPTIC ANSWERED. 

Being interrupted by a man in his audience during a meeting, 
Mr. Moody said : " My friend, if you will let me get through I 
will listen to you all night. But don't stop me to ask skeptical 
questions because they only strengthen my faith." 

ONE PLACE OF SAFETY. 

Out in our western country in the autumn, when men go 
hunting, and there has not been any rain for months, sometimes 
the prairie grass catches fire, and there comes up a very strong 
wind, and the flames just roll along twenty feet high, and go at 
the rate of thirty or forty miles an hour. 

When the frontier-men see it coming, what do they do ? 
They know they cannot run as fast as the fire can run. Not the 
fleetest horse can escape from that fire. They just take a match 
and light the grass around them, and let the fire sweep it, and 
then they get into the burnt district and stand safe. They hear 
the flames roar ; they see death coming towards them ; but they 
do not fear, they do not tremble ; because the fire has passed over 
the place where they are, and there is no danger. There is noth- 
ing for the fire to burn. 

There is one mountain peak that the wrath of God has swept 
over ; that is Mount Calvary, and that fire spent its fury upon the 
bosom of the Son of God. Take your stand here by the cross, 
and you will be safe for time and eternity. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 459 

CHRIST'S FORGIVENESS FOR HIS MURDERERS. 

I can imagine when Christ said to the little band around Him, 
" Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel." Peter said, 
" Lord, do yon really mean that we are to go back to Jerusalem 
and preach the Gospel to those men that murdered you?" "Yes," 
said Christ, " go hunt up that man that spat in my face; tell him 
he ma}- have a seat in my kingdom yet. Yes, Peter, go find that 
man that made that cruel crown of thorns and placed it on my 
brow, and tell him I will have a crown ready for him when he 
comes into my kingdom, and there will be no thorns in it. Hunt 
up that man that took a reed and brought it down over the cruel 
thorns, driving them into my brow, and tell him I will put a 
sceptre in his hand, and he shall rule over the nations of the 
earth, if he will accept salvation. Search for the man that drove 
the spear into my side, and tell him there is a nearer way to my 
heart than that. Tell him I forgive him freely, and that he can 
be saved if he will accept salvation as a gift. Tell him there is a 
nearer way to my heart than that." 

AN EARNEST LEADER. 

Mr. Moody once consented to permit an expert in palmistry 
to read his hand and was immensely pleased when told that his 
distinguishing characteristics were love of his fellowmen and 
ability as a leader. "That's good," said he. "I'll try to lead 
every man in the world to Christ." 

OVERCOMING JEALOUSY. 
Here is a story that Mr. Moody told himself: " I found myself 
in Chicago a few years ago getting jealous of a prominent clergy- 
man. He was saying harsh things about me. I found that I was 
feeling harshly toward him. I said to myself: ' Moody, this 
won't do.' I went to him and told him that I wanted him to take 
charge of a prominent meeting. He said he'd come. Then I 
took pains to see that he should have a tremendously large audi- 
ence. He preached a fine sermon. He came to me and said kind 
words. Since then we have been great friends. Don't ever let 
jealousy get control of you." 



460 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PITHY SAYINGS OF THE GREAT EVANGELIST. 

A man must believe himself lost before lie can be saved. 

No sinner ever came to Christ but the devil tried to trip him 
up on the way. 

No man can resolve himself into heaven. 

If you wish to possess love for God's word, study it diligently 
and so become like an artesian well — overflowing with the water 
of life to refresh thirsty souls. 

A great many people think they have been born again because 
they go to church. Let me say that there is no one that goes to 
church so regularly as Satan. 

When a man is thought much of in this world it is quite 
likely Christ won't have much to say for him in the next 
world. 

We are naturally all bad. Who would be willing to have his 
or her heart photographed, with all its thoughts and passions 
brought to view ? 

If the water in the well is poisoned, you do not try to remedy 
it by pulling out the pump. 

Praying doesn't do any good unless it comes from the heart. 

I have no use for the man who thinks he is so good that he 
wants a little harp all for himself when he gets to heaven. 

" My husband is so good," say some foolish wives ; "he lacks 
only one thing, he is not a Christian." Well, all a dead man 
lacks is one thing — life. 

If the Church were baptized with the spirit of Calvary, the 
fruits of the spirit would be more in evidence among its members. 

POOR BIBLE READERS 

In an address on reading the Scriptures, Mr. Moody observed 
that no one should require to use a marker when he closed his 
Bible ; he ought to study it with such earnestness as to remember 
exactly where he left off. Then came an illustration right to the 
point. He explained that in earlier life he used to hoe corn, but 
did his work so badly that when he went to dinner he was obliged 
to put a stick to show where he had left off. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4(51 

TREATMENT OF CRITICS. 

When Miss Helen Gould laid the corner stone at Overtoun 
Hall, at East Northfield, Mr. Moody saw one of his relatives com- 
ing toward the platform. The exercises had been started, but Mr. 
Moody turned to his wife, and said, so that eve^ one on the plat- 
form could hear : " There comes Aunt Mandy Holton, mamma ; 
make a good place for her on the platform," and his order was 
carried out. " Aunt Mandy " had been one who criticised Mr. 
Moody severely. 

THE PLAGUE OF FROGS. 

Look at poor old Pharaoh down there in Egypt, when the 
plague of frogs was on him. What an awful time he must have 
had ! Frogs in the fields, and frogs in the houses ; frogs in the 
bedrooms, and frogs in the kneading troughs. When the king 
went to bed, a frog would jump on to his face ; when he cut into a 
loaf of bread, there was a frog in the middle of it. Nothing but 
frogs everywhere ! Frogs, frogs, frogs ! He stood it as long as he 
could ; and then he sent for Moses, and begged him to take them 
away. " When would you like to have me do it?" says Moses. 
Now j ust listen to what he says. You would think he would say, 
Now ! this minute ! I have had them long enough ! But he says, 
" To-morrow." Kept the frogs another day, when he might have 
got rid of them at once ! That is just like you, sinner. You say 
you want to be saved ; but you are willing to keep your hateful, 
hideous sins until to-morrow, instead of being rid of them now. 

HEELS VERSUS HEART 

One of the seminary girls in Northfield intimated to Mr. 

Moody that dancing among family friends was desirable. Mr. 

Moody's reply was : " My dear girl, I would a thousand times 

rather have you get more grace in your heart and less in your 

heels." 

HOW TO TREAT DISCOURAGEMENTS. 

There is a large class of people who are always looking upon 
the dark side. Some time ago, I myself got under the juniper 
tree. In those days I used to fish all night, and catch nothing. 



4S2 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

One of the workers in our Mission came in to see me one Mon- 
day morning, full of joy, saying what a good Sunday he had. 
" Well," said I, " I am glad you have had a good day ; but I have 
had a very bad one. 1 ' He knew I had been in trouble of mind, 
and so he said, "Did you ever study Noah?" "No," said I; 
" I have read about him, but I don't know that I have ever studied 
him." "Well," said he, "study him. It will do you good." So 
I began to study Noah, and I found out that he preached for a 
hundred and twent}^ years without making a single convert. 
"That is a good deal worse than my case," thought I; and that 
made me feel better at once. That day I went down to the noon 
prayer-meeting, and one poor sinner arose and asked us to pray 
for him. " What would old Noah have given for that ? " thought 
I. I tell you, my friends, what we want is perseverance. When 
God sets us at anything, we want to keep at it, and leave all the 
consequences with him. 

TEST OF PERFECTION. 

A man attending one of the Moody meetings said that he 
was perfect. The evangelist replied: "I'm glad to know it, but 
I'd like to talk with your wife." 

ALL ON THE SAME LEVEL. 

One of his patrons said one day, " Mr. Moody, I can afford 
to pay $200 for my boy's tuition." 

"Send another boy, then, to use the second hundred ; I cannot 
afford to make an exception of your boy. The students here are 
all on the same plane." 

PERFECT TRUST. 

My little Willie I once told to jump off a high table and I 
would catch him. But he looked down and said, "Papa, I'se 
afraid." I again told him I'd catch him, and he looked down and 
said, " Papa, I'se afraid." You smile, but that's just the way with 
the unbeliever. He looks down and dare not trust the Lord. You 
say that would be blind faith, but I say it wouldn't. I told Willie 
to look at me, and then jump, and he did it, and was delighted. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4G3 

He wanted to jump again, and finally his faith became so great 
that he would have jumped when I was eight or ten feet away, 
and said, " Papa, I'se a comin'." I remember seeing a man in 
Mobile putting little boys on the fence posts, and they jumped 
into his arms with perfect confidence. But there was one boy nine 
or ten years old who would not jump. I asked the man why it 
was, and he said the boy wasn't his. Ah, that's it. The boy 
wasn't his. He hadn't learned to trust him. But the other boys 
knew him and could trust him. 

SIMPLICITY OF FAITH. 

Let us have faith. Don't be looking to see if you have got 
the right kind of faith. Look and see if you have got the right 
kind of Christ. Now faith is just the hand that reaches out and 
gets the blessing. Faith sees a thing in God's hand. Faith says 
I will have it. I see that book in Mr. Dodge's hand ; I go and take 
it ; I have got faith that he will let me have it. Now, my friends, 
have faith in God to-night. Faith is an outward look, not an 
inward look. A great many people are looking at their feelings, 
a great many people are looking down here. Don't be looking at 
your feelings, but look at Heaven, and if you have got the right 
kind of Christ you will have the right kind of faith. 

Suppose a man who had been in the habit of meeting a beggar 
on the street, and he might say, I have met this man for years 
out here begging, and as I go up to-night I meet him ; he has got 
a nice suit of clothes on and I say to him, "Hnllo, beggar," and 
he says, " Don't you call me a beggar ; I am no beggar." Why, 
are you not a beggar ?" " No, sir ; I am not a beggar." " What 
is the reason you are not a beggar ?" " Why, I was sitting there 
to-day and I put out my hand and asked a man to give me some- 
thing. Mr. Dodge came along and he put five thousand dollars 
right into my hand." " How do you know it is good money ?" "I 
took it to the bank." " How did you get it ? " "I put my hand 
out and he just pnt it in my hand.' 75 How do you know it is the 
right kind of a hand?" " O, pooh ! what do I care what kind of 
a hand it was !" 



4G4 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

HOW TO MAKE CONFESSION. 

Every man ought to make a public confession if his sin has 
been public. Suppose, now, I have done this man a wrong, and 
no one knows it but us two. Then the confession ought to be 
between us two alone. I don't believe in making confession of 
such a thing publicly ; it isn't called for. Suppose I had a diffi- 
culty with my family. It ought to be settled with my family. It 
needn't go forth to the world. But suppose I have been a public 
blasphemer — have been seen reeling in the streets of Northfield a 
drunkard — it is known by all the people here — I ought to make 
my confession so that the whole town will hear it, and the chances 
are they will receive my testimony. 

THE BELIEVER'S SECURITY. 

What is it that protects the crown of Victoria? It is the army. 
The army keeps the crown perfectly safe. I remember in London 
holding meetings in the East End, and as we were going along the 
streets one night, we met some soldiers marching. I said : 
"Where are those soldiers going?" "They are going to the 
Bank of England." It was the law of the land that just as soon 
as the sun went down, a certain number of soldiers went to the 
Bank of England and stayed there till daybreak. That made the 
bank perfectly safe. There was no chance for thieves to get in 
there. So, if our life is hid in Christ, how are the powers of 
darkness going to get at it ? 

LIBERATED FROM PRISON. 

There was a story told me while I was in Philadelphia by Capt. 
Trumbull. He said when he was in Libby Prison the news came 
that his wife was in Washington, and his little child was dying ; 
and the next news that came was that his child was dead, and the 
mother remained in Washington in hopes that her husband could 
come with her and take that child off to New England and bury 
it ; but that was the last he heard. One day the news came into 
the prison that there was a boat up from City Point, and there 
were over nine hundred men in the prison rejoicing at once. They 
expected to get good news. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4G5 

Then came the news that there was only one man in that 
whole number that was to be let go, and they all began to say, 
"Who is it?" It was some one who had some influential friend 
at Washington that had persuaded the Government to take an 
interest in him and get him out. The whole prison was excited. 
At last an officer came and shouted at the top of his voice, 
" Henry Clay Trumbull I" The chaplain told me his name never 
sounded so sweet to him as it did that day. 

That was election — but you can't find any Henry Clay Trum- 
bull in the Bible. There is no special case in the Bible. God's 
proclamations are to all sinners. Everybody can get out of prison 
that wants to. The trouble is they don't want to go. They had 
rather be captives to some darling sin like lust, appetite, covete- 
ousness, than to be liberated. You need not be stumbling over 
election. The proclamation is, "Whosoever will, let him come 
and drink of the water of life freely," 

ALWAYS AT IT. 

There are some 'who say, " We don't have any sympathy with 
these special efforts"; and I symathize with that objection. I 
believe it is the privilege of the child of God to make continuous 
efforts for the salvation of others, every day throughout the year. 

PARDONED BY HER MAJESTY. 
Once, in a town in England, just before I went there they 
had a very dark Sabbath. The whole city seemed to be moved, 
and everybody talked about it. There was a man there in prison 
that had been condemned to die. He was to be executed on Mon- 
day. They had tried to get the authorities to pardon him and had 
failed, so he was to be executed the next day. The black flag 
waved over that prison all day on that Sabbath. Ministers preached 
about it and held the man up as a warning. It seemed that a dark 
cloud hung over the city all day. Sunday night the poor, con- 
demned man could not sleep. He was greatly agitated and 
excited. The next day he was to be led out to execution. He 
was to be hung the next morning. About midnight he heard the 
footsteps of a man coming to his cell. The poor man trembled, 

30 



466 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

and at last there came the governor of the prison, bringing a dis- 
patch from the Qneen pardoning the man ! 

O, they said, what joy there was in that cell, what joy there 
was in that man's heart when deliverance came ! I have come to 
bring yon a proclamation of deliverance. Yon are slaves. Sen- 
tence is ont against yon. Yon are already condemned, and wait- 
ing for the execution. I have come to tell yon of One who will 
set yon free if yon will believe Him. 

SOWING AND REAPING. 

I remember reading in history that in the da}^s of Louis XI. 
he had a cruel, wicked bishop that was persecnting some of the 
saints of the Most High God, and the king wanted to know how 
he conld make their pnnishment more crnel and bitter. "Well," 
said the bishop, "make them a cage, and have it so short and 
narrow they cannot lie down, and so low they cannot stand straight, 
and they will have to be in a bent position all the while." The 
king ordered the cage made, and the very first one that went into 
that cage was the bishop himself. He had offended the king before 
he got the cage finished, and for fourteen long years the king kept 
him in that cage. He had to reap what he sowed. 

ON DANGEROUS GROUND. 

Be sure that your sin, young man, will find yon out. It may 
be this very day yon took out of your employer's till twenty-five 
cents. Perhaps last week you took fifty cents and went to the 
theatre with it. But you say, " I will put it back some time." 
That is the way these defaulters begin. That is the way men 
that become forgers begin. Men don't go to a precipice 
and jump down. They come down step by step. It is these 
little things — twenty-five cents or a dollar. You say, " I can 
replace that any time ; that don't amount to anything." Ah, my 
friends, " Be not deceived." A man that steals twenty-five cents 
is just as much a thief as one that steals $5000. He has made 
his conscience guilty. He is not the man he was before he took 
it. He is laying a bad foundation, and if he attempts to build on 
that foundation the structure will fall. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4G7 

THE GOSPEL OF FREEDOM. 

When Wilberforce was trying to get a bill through Parliament 
to liberate all the slaves under the British flag, away off in the 
islands subject to the British flag there was great excitement. 
They were anxious to get their liberty. When they were expect- 
ing the vessel which would bring the news that the bill had failed 
or succeeded, thousands of people went down to the shore to get 
the first news. The captain of the coming vessel knew how 
anxious they were to get it. As soon as the vessel was in sight, 
and he saw the multitude on the shore watching for him, he 
shouted the words, " Free ! free ! free ! " and they all took up the 
cry, and it spread through the island. 

Oh, my friends, we came here to-day to proclaim the Gospel 

message. " Free, free." You vvill never know what liberty is 

until you know Christ. This very hour you can be free if you 

want to be. We come to proclaim the Gospel of freedom here 

to-day. 

THAT COLD WORD "DUTY." 

I am tired of the word duty ; tired of hearing duty, duty, 
duty. Men go to church because it is their duty. They go to 
prayer-meeting because it is their duty. You can never reach a 
man's heart if you talk to him because it is your duty. Suppose 
I told my wife I loved her because it was my duty — what would 
she say? Once every year I go up to Massachusetts to visit my 
aged mother. Suppose, when I go next time, I tell her that I 
knew she was old and that she was living on borrowed time ; that 
I knew she had always done a great deal for me, and that I came 
to see her every year because it was my duty. Don't you think 
she would say, " Well then, my son, you needn't take the trouble 
to come again?" Let us strike for a higher plane. 

PUT YOURSELF IN THEIR WAY. 

There was a prominent minister in New York City — a good 
man too — and one of his elders said to him : " Why can't we 
have an inquiry meeting? It seems to me we might have a great 
many converts just now." The minister said: "Well, just to 



4G8 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

please you I will try one, but I don't believe any one will come to 
it." So the next night be announced that if there were any per- 
sons concerned about their souls, the session would be in the 
session room, and meet them. Why ! he might as well have asked 
them to go before a j ustice of the peace. Asking an awakened 
soul to go before the whole session. If you want to get these 
people to talk with you, put yourself in their way, and make it 
easy for them to come and see you. 

LOVE FOR EVERYTHING. 

When we are truly converted we love all things and all men 
better than ever before. The morning I was converted I went out 
of doors and I fell in love with the bright sun shining over the 
earth ; I never loved the sun before. And when I heard the birds 
singing their sweet songs, I fell in love with the birds ; like the 
Scotch lassie who stood on the hills of her native land, breathing 
the sweet air, and when asked why she did it, said : "I love the 
Scotch air." If the church was filled with love, it could do so 
much more. 

THEY LOVE A FELLOW OVER THERE. 

One Sunday a lady was out collecting scholars for a Sunday- 
school met a boy and asked him why he went so far, past so many 
schools, to get to his own. " There are plenty of others," said 
she, a just as good." He said, "They may be so good, but they 
are not so good for me." " Why not ? " she asked. " Because 
they love a fellow over there," he answered. Ah ! love won him. 
"Because they love a fellow over there!" How easy it is to 
reach people through love ! Sunday-school teachers should win 
the affections of the scholars if they wish to lead them to Christ. 
Those who are successful in winning the affections of men, are 
successful in winning them to Christ. 

WHAT A SMILE CAN DO. 

In London, in 1872, one Sunday morning a minister said to 
me, " I want you to notice that family there in one of the front 
seats, and when we go home I want to tell you their story." 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4G9 

When we got home I asked him for the story, and he said " All 
that family were won by a smile." 

kk Why," said I, " how's that ? " " Well," said he, " as I was 
walking down the street one day I saw a child at a window ; it 
smiled, and I smiled, and we bowed. So it was the second time ; I 
bowed, she bowed. It was not long before there was another 
child, and I had got in a habit of looking and bowing, and pretty 
soon the group grew, and at last as I went by, a lady was with 
them. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to bow to her, 
bnt I knew the children expected it, and so I bowed to them all. 
And the mother saw I was a minister, because I carried a Bible 
every Sunday morning. So the children followed me the next 
Sunday and found I was a minister. And they thought I was the 
greatest preacher, and their parents must hear me. A minister 
who is kind to a child and gives him a pat on the head, why the 
children will think he is the greatest preacher in the world. 
Kindness goes a great way. And, to make a long story short, the 
father and mother and five children were converted, and they are 
going to join our church next Sunday. Won by a smile." 

THE POWER OF LOVE. 

A gentleman one day came to my office for the purpose of 
getting me interested in a young man who had just got out of the 
penitentiary. "He says," said the gentlemen, " he don't want to 
go to the office, but I want your permission to bring him in and 
introduce him." I said, " Bring him in." The gentleman brought 
him in and introduced him, and I took him by the hand and told 
him I was glad to see him. I invited him up to my house, and 
when I took him into my family I introduced him as my friend. 
When my little daughter came into the room I said, " Emma, this 
is papa's friend." And she went up and kissed him, and the man 
sobbed aloud. After the child left the room I said, "What is the 
matter?" " O Sir," he said, "I have not had a kiss for years. 
The last kiss I had was from my mother, and she was dying. I 
thought I would never love another one again." His heart was 
broken. 



470 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Just that little kindness showed I was in sympathy with him. 
Another young man, just out of the penitentiary, came to me, and 
after I had talked with him for some time, he didn't seem to think 
I was in sympathy with him. I offered him a little money, "No," 
he said, "I don't want your money." "What do you want?" "I 
want some one to have confidence in me." I got down and 
prayed with him, and in my prayer I called him a brother and he 
shed tears the moment I called him a brother. So if we are going 
to reach men we must make them believe we are their brothers. 

MORE LIFE WANTED. 

I have come tc this conclusion, that if we are going to have 
successful Gospel meetings, we have got to have a little more life 
in them. Life is found in singing new hymns, for instance. I 
know some churches that have been singing about a dozen hymns 
for the last twenty years, such hymns as " Rock of Ages," "There 
is a fountain filled with blood," etc. The hymns are always good, 
but we want a variety. We want new hymns as well as the 
old ones. I find it wakes up a congregation very much to bring 
in now and then a new hymn. 

And if you cannot wake them up with preaching, let us sing 
it into them. I believe the time is coming when we will make a 
good deal more of just singing the Gospel. Then when a man is 
converted, let us have him in these meetings, giving his testimony. 
Some people are afraid of that. I believe the secret of John Wes- 
ley's success was that he set every man to work as soon as he was 
converted. Of course, you have to guard that point. Some say 
they become spiritually proud — no doubt of that ; but if they 
don't go to work they become spiritually lazy, and I don't know 
what's the difference. 

BRINGING OUT LATENT TALENTS. 

I believe there are a great many in our church prayer meet- 
ings who could be brought out and made to be a great help if the 
ministers would only pay their attention to it. How many lawyers, 
physicians, public speakers we have who do nothing to actively 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 471 

help along the work, and I believe that difficulty could be removed 
if the ministers would take a little pains. Let the father whose 
son has been converted get up and give thanks. Have once in a 
while a thanksgiving meeting. It wakes np a church wonder- 
fully once in a while to let the yonng converts relate their 
experiences. Then yon say, what are yon going to do with these 
men who talk so long ? I would talk to them privately, and tell 
them they must try to be shorter. And it is a good thing some- 
times for ministers themselves not to be too long. Sometimes 
they read a good deal of Scripture and talk until perhaps only 
fifteen minutes is left, and then they complain because Deacon 
Smith or Jones or someone else talks too long. 

Just let the minister strike the key note of the meeting, and 
if he can't do that in ten minutes, he can't at all. Very often a 
minister takes up a chapter and exhausts it, and says everything 
he can think of in the chapter, and then can you wonder a lay- 
man cannot say more who has had no study of the subject? Give 
out the subject a week ahead, let the minister take five or ten 
minutes in opening, and then let the different ones take part. 
That would be greater variety. When a man takes part he 
gets greatly interested himself. It was pretty true what the old 
deacon said, that when he took part in the meetings they were 
very interesting, and when he didn't they seemed very dull. 

HOW TO CONDUCT PRAYER MEETINGS. 

I remember in Chicago, the last winter I was there, we had 
preaching every afternoon. We went out with invitations into 
saloons, billiard halls, etc;, and we got a large audience there 
every afternoon, and we had a new minister every day. We 
wanted to bring in all denominations to keep harmony, and I 
believe there was one solitary conversion after preaching thirty 
days. If we had only stuck to one minister I believe we would 
have done a great work then and there ; and if we are going to 
have successful evangelistic services we cannot be changing 
speakers every night. And that is why it is best to get a man 
out of town and all will unite on that one man. I wish we could 



472 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

get rid of this jealousy. If we could uuite ou oue man and sup- 
port him with our prayers and our money, if it need be, and 
just work with him, there would be results. I never knew it to 
fail yet. It is just this party feeling that comes in and pre- 
vents the good results we expect. We are afraid this denomina- 
tion won't like it, and that denomination won't be properly repre- 
sented. 

Then these meetings ought to be made short. I find a great 
many are killed because they are too long. The minister speaks 
five minutes, and a minister's five minutes is always ten, and his 
ten minutes is always twenty, and the result is you preach 
everybody into the spirit and out of it before the meeting 
is over. When the people leave they are glad to go home, and 
ought to go home. Now, you send the people away hungry and 
they will come back again. There was a man in London who 
preached in the open air until everybody left him, and somebody 
said, " Why did you preach so long ? " " Oh," said he, "I thought 
it would be a pity to stop while there was anybody listening." 
It is a good deal better to cut right off, then people will come 
back again to hear. 

RECOGNITION ON EARTH. 

Two young men came into our inquiry room here the other 
night, and after a convert had talked with them, and showed them 
the way, the light broke in upon them. They were asked, "Where 
do you go to church? " They gave the name of the church 
where they had been going. Said one, " I advise you to go and 
see the minister of that church." They said, "We don't want to 
go there any more ; we have gone there for six years and no one 
has spoken to us." 

A man was preaching about Christians recognizing each other 
in heaven, and some one said, "I wish he would preach about 
recognizing each other on earth." In one place where I preached 
there was no special interest. I looked over the great hall of the 
old- circus building where it was held, and saw men talking to 
other men here and there. I said to the Secretary of the Young 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 473 

Men's Christian Association, who got np the meeting, " Who are 
these men?" He said, u They are a band of workers." They 
were all scattered through the hall and preaching and watching 
for sonls. Out of the fifty of them, forty-one of their number 
had got a sonl each and were talking and preaching with them. 
We have been asleep long enough. When the laity wake np and 
try and help the minister the minister will preach better. If the 
minister finds he has not been drawing the net right, if a good 
many in his chnrch go to work and help him he will do better ; 
he will prepare the sermons with that one thing in view. 

UP IN A BALLOON. 

When men going np in a balloon, have ascended a little height, 
things down here begin to look very small indeed. What had 
seemed very grand and imposing now seem as mere nothings ; and 
the higher they rise the smaller everything on earth appears ; it 
gets fainter and fainter as they rise, till the railway train, dash- 
ing along at fifty miles an honr, seems like a thread, and scarcely 
seems to be moving at all, and the grand piles of buildings seem 
now like mere dots. So it is when we get near heaven : earth's 
treasures, earth's cares, look very small. 

''DON'T SEND ME." 

There are but few now that say, "Here am I, Lord; send 
me;" the cry now is, "Send some one else. Send the minister, 
send the church officers, the church wardens, the elders ; but 
not me. I have not got the ability, the gifts, or the talents." 
Ah ! honestly say you have not got the heart ; for if the heart is 
loyal, God can use you. It is really all a matter of heart. It 
does not take God a great while to qualify a man for his work, if 
he only has the heart for it. 

" ROLL YE AWAY THE STONE." 

When Jesus, along with His little band of disciples, came to 
the grave wherein Lazarus was laid, they found it covered by a 
stone. Jesus could have removed the stone Himself; but, notice, 



474 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

He bade His followers to remove the stone. And we find that after 
the Master had restored the dead man to life, He also said to 
them : " Loose him, and let him go." The Master conld have 
loosed him; bnt He said to His disciples: "Yon loose him." 
What lesson does the Master mean to teach ns by this ? He means 
to teach his followers that, whilst He alone can speak the word of 
life to dead sonls, He wants ns to remove the stone, and to loose 
the poor sonls and let them go. He wonld have ns to be co-workers 
with Him. 

DOWN IN A COALPIT. 

Did any of yon ever go down into a coalpit, fifteen hnndred 
or two thousand feet, right down into the bowels of the earth ? If 
yon have, don't yon know that it would be sheer madness to try 
to climb up the steep sides of that shaft and so get out of the pit ? 
Of course, you couldn't leap out of it ; in fact, you couldn't get 
out of it at all by yourself. But I'll tell you this — you could get 
out of a coalpit fifteen hundred feet deep a good deal quicker than 
you can get out of the pit that Adam took you into. When Adam 
went down into it, he took the whole human family with him. 
But the Lord can take us out. 

ON THE MOUNTAIN PEAK. 

When it is dark and stormy here, strive to rise higher and 
higher, near to Christ ; and you will find it all calm there. You 
know that it is the highest mountain peaks that catch the first 
rays of the sun. So those who rise highest catch the first news 
from heaven. It is those sunny Christians who go through the 
world with smiles on their faces, that win souls. And, on the 
other hand, it is those Christians who go through the world hanging 
their heads like bullrushes, that scare people away from religion. 
Why, it's a libel on Christianity for a religious man to go about 
with such a downcast look ! What does the Master say ? — " My 
joy I leave with you, my joy I give unto you." Depend upon it, 
if our minds were stayed upon Him, we should have perfect 
peace ; and with perfect peace we should have perfect joy. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 475 

THE FRESH ANOINTING. 
While I was in England I met a minister whose health had 
become so poor that he had to get an assistant to help him preach. 
He could only preach once a week, and not always that. One day, 
in meeting, the spirit of God came upon him anew, and he got 
freshly anointed. He came down to London a year afterwards 
and told me that dnring the past year he had preached eight ser- 
mons a week. He said he had never been so well in all his life. 
I believe it is not work that breaks down onr health ; it is pumping 
without the water! What we want to do is just to wait on God 
until He gives it to us. I know a minister who told me he felt 
that he was preaching without this anointing, and he felt that his 
sermons had not been blessed for a long, long time. I know it was 
my own experience. I never like to talk about myself; it always 
makes me feel like a fool, but this may do some of you some 

good. 

CHRIST, THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 

In this parable we get the whole Gospel. Jerusalem was the 
city of peace. Jericho was a city condemned, and from one to the 
other was all the way down hill — an easy road to go, as the unfor- 
tunate man thought when he started on his journey. But he fell 
among thieves, who stripped him and left him half dead, and the 
priest and the Levite passed him by. These two men represent a 
large class of people. We can imagine the priest asking himself, 
"Am I my brother's keeper?" and complaining, "What did he 
want to go down there for any way ? Why didn't he stay at 
home? He was a great deal better off in Jerusalem — he might 
have known something would happen to him." Some people think 
they have done their duty when they blame the poor for 
their poverty, and the unfortunate for the accidents which hap- 
pen to them. 

There is another class who always begin to philosophize the 
minute they see any suffering. " Why does God have these things ? 
Why does He have sin and poverty in the world, I would like to 
know? He needn't have it; He could just as well have made a 
world without it." But here comes the good Samaritan ; he 



476 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

does more than pity and philosophize; he helps, gives oil, and 
lifts the poor fellow on his beast. He is not afraid to tonch 
him. 

He don't stop to ask whether he is Jew or Gentile, or jnst 
what he is going to do with the man if he takes him away from 
there. Now a great many people ask ns, "What are you going to 
do with these young converts when you get them? Where will you 
put them — into what church — Methodist, Baptist, Episcopal ?" 
"Well, we don't know; we have not thought of that; we are try- 
ing to get them out of the ditch first." "Oh, well then, we don't 
want to have anything to do with it ; we want it to be done decently 
and in order if we are going to have a hand in it." 

These people are no Samaritans ; they won't have anything 
to do with the poor fellows by the wayside if they cannot dispose 
of them ever afterwards to suit themselves. Let us not condemn 
those who have fallen into the ditch. Christ is our Good Samari- 
tan ; He has done for us, and tells us to do for others. 

THE CLEAN HEART. 

Is our heart clean in the sight of God? Has He renewed a 
right spirit within us ? Do we show that in our home, in our daily 
life, in our business, and in our contact with others ? If we do 
not, it seems to me it is better to be praying for ourselves than 
for others, that the world may see that we have been with God's 
Spirit. If we are a great way from Christ in all our ways, our 
words will be cold and empty, and we cannot reach the world. 
There is power enough in this room to move all New York if we 
had the right spirit and clean hearts. A friend of mine told me 
he had been preaching some time without seeing any results in his 
church, and he began to cry to God that he might have a blessing 
in his church. 

He said weeks went on and the answer didn't come, and he 
felt as if he must either have a blessing £>r give up the ministry. 
He must have souls or die, and he said that on one Sunday he 
threw himself on his knees in his study and cried to God : " Oh ! 
God, break this heart of mine and give me a contrite spirit." Just 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 477 

at this moment he heard a faint rap at the door, and opening it, 
his little child, four years old, entered. She had heard her father's 
prayers, and she said, "Father, I wish you would pray for me, I 
want a clean heart." "And," said he, "God broke my heart, and 
at the next meeting there were forty inquirers, after that one ser- 
mon." Oh, that our hearts may be tender, and may we know what 
it is to have broken hearts and contrite spirits. 

GOD'S POWER TO SAVE THE DRUNKARD. 

"Oh, Lord God! behold, Thou hast made the heaven and the 
earth by Thy great power and stretched-out arm, and there is 
nothing too hard for Thee." — Jer. xxxii : 17. 

Air. Moody said he had taken that chapter to every place 
where he had been. He . had tried to find a substitute, but had 
never succeeded. He then said : 

It's just what we want to give the keynote to our meetings. 
Many of us look about and see so many wretched and wicked peo- 
ple that we become disheartened. But it's as easy for God 
to save every drunkard and infidel in this city, as it is for Him to 
turn His hand over. Think of this earth that God has made, with 
its mountains and rivers ! Some one has said it is only a ball 
thrown from the hand of God, and another that the stars and the 
moon are only the fringe of his garments. If God can do these 
great things, think you He can't save drunkards? If He could 
speak worlds into existence, can't He save dead souls? I have 
more hope of these prayer meetings than of any others. 

But if we don't get a hold of God here, we won't anywhere. I 
believe that God answers prayers. If we ask a fish. He won't give 
us a stone. Some have said these meetings will pass away and 
do no good. But it won't be so if God is with us. The late war 
taught men how to pray. It seems to me that some of the best 
work I ever saw was among the soldiers. Those boys away from 
their mothers, how many prayers were uttered for them, and how 
many were converted ! I well remember a young lieutenant from 
Indiana. 

In one of our meetings, when we had been speaking of 



478 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

mothers' prayers, lie got up and said the remarks reminded him of 
letters he had received from his mother, expressing great anxiety 
about his soul. He had told her he would come to Christ after 
the war ; but she reminded him he might never see that time. 
Another letter came from his home, and that mother was dead. 
And with the tears trickling down his cheeks, that noble young 
man told his tale, and came to know his Saviour. Xow we come 
to-day to call upon the Lord for a great blessing to rest upon this 
mighty city. 

A RAINY-DAY PRAYER MEETING. 

There are five precious clauses in this 103d Psalm, viz. : u He 
forgiveth all thine iniquities;" "He healeth all thy diseases;" 
"He redeemeth thy life from destruction,' ' and "He crowneth 
thee with loving kindness.' ' Christianity is better than anything 
that the world can give. It satisfies us. This is what wealth 
cannot do. The crowns of Europe cannot give the peace and 
contentment that come from the Crown of Life. I like these 
rainy-day prayer meetings. It costs us something to get here. 

HOW TO PRAY. 

God heard the voice of His people in ancient days, and He 
will hear our cries if made in the right spirit. One reason why so 
man}' prayers go unanswered is that they are not in accordance 
with the will of God, or because we have not been sufficiently 
cleansed from our sins. Some secret sin may be clustering around 
our hearts which He wants removed first. John, in his Gospel, 
tells us that it is the comfort that if we ask anything according to 
His will it will be received. 

But some will say: "Well, how am I to know what is the will 
of God?" Just turn to Romans, viii : 6: "Likewise the Spirit also 
helpeth our infirmities ; for we know not what we should pray for 
as we ought ; but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with 
groanings which cannot be uttered." This leads us into Luke, 
xi : 1 : "And it came to pass that one of His disciples said unto 
Him, Lord, teach us how to pray as John also taught his disci- 
ples." 






MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 479 

I have no doubt many persons here have said, "Lord, teach 
me how to pray." I'd rather be able to pray like Daniel than to 
preach like David. The world knows little of the works wrought 
' by prayer. But our words at the best seem empty and cold. 
Christ replied to the disciple, "When ye pray, say, Our Father 
which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name." Later He says: 
"Ask and it shall be given you." 

In this ninth verse we find three classes of Christians men- 
tioned — the asking, the seeking, and the knocking Christians. 
There are a good many in the first class. They are continually 
asking but do not seek. If you will allow me the expression, 
they run away from the mercy seat before God has had time to 
answer them. Then there are the seeking Christians, who are a 
step in advance. They always try to find out what God wants 
them to do, and where the trouble lies within themselves. 

There is not a Christian on the face of the earth who, if he 
enters upon this self-examination, but will find that when his 
prayers are not answered there is something in his own heart 
which he cherishes, but should give up. Lastly we have the 
knocking Christians. This is the class we want here. If you 
knock "it shall be opened," and keep knocking until it is. When 
the Holy Ghost is upon us, how every one longs to speak and work 
for God ! Let us ask for great things — that God may fill us with 
the Holy Spirit, and we may learn to do His will. 

We don't know how to pray. Unless the Spirit of God be 
with us, we cannot expect that our prayers will be answered. 
Many are asking for what would be an injury to them should God 
grant it. God knows what we want better than we. He knows 
when anything would injure us, should we have it, and it is 
because he loves us that many prayers are unanswered. We 
sometimes fail to see why God withholds certain gifts, but later 
in life we will understand it. 

I well remember how I wanted many things some years ago, 
and can plainly see that they might have been a positive injury to 
me. It is well for us to make all our requests. Children ask 
many things of their parents, but the parent does not always grant 






480 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

their requests. We love them too well to give what would Harm 
them. So it is with God and our prayers. I want to call your 
attention to the third Chapter of Deuteronomy, where prayers 
were uttered which were not answered. Moses wanted to cross the 
Jordan. He was praying for himself. It was no sign God did not 
love him because He did not answer that prayer. He loved Moses 
as he did no other man of that time. He took him up to a moun- 
tain, let him die as it were on His breast and then buried him. 
After fifteen hundred years that prayer was answered. He was 
over Jordan on the mountain with Elias. 

And there was Elijah, who prayed that he might die. He 
was the only man living, I guess, who ever prayed for death. But 
wasn't it better for Elijah to go to heaven in that chariot of fire ? 
Yes. God loved him too much to let him die. It is a good deal 
better to let God choose than to choose ourselves. 

CONFESSING OUR SINS. 

It is when we confess our sins that we have power within. It 
was when Abraham was down in the dust that God talked with 
him. When we have not confessed our own sins it is no time to 
urge others to come to Christ. Should we attempt it, they might 
say to us, " Physician, heal thyself. Get the beam out of thine 
own eye." If a man is irritable in his own house, and fails to 
manifest the doctrine of Christ in his own life, it is useless for him 
to talk with others. It will help us, as workers in God's vineyard, 
if we drop the "you" in our conversation, and say "we." There 
is power enough in this hall to move all New York, if we only 
were aroused to the work, and were all right in our own hearts. 

There may be some secret sin lurking around our own hearts 
which we need to get rid of. There is no room for pride, self, and 
worldliness in the hearts of those who are filled with the Spirit. It 
isn't preaching that we want. You've had preaching enough to 
convert all this city, and its good preaching. You have intellec- 
tual power in your pulpits — perhaps you never had more. But 
what you all need is the power of prayer. We must confess to 
God, for we are sinners against Him. It's not to man that we 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4R1 

must confess. We haven't sinned against him. I know of only 
one instance mentioned in the Bible where a man confessed his 
sins to men, and that was Judas, and he went out and hanged him- 
self. O, let us have more of the spirit of confession in our 
prayers. 

A man often wonders why his prayer isn't answered, and 
asks, " Hasn't God said that whatever we ask for we shall receive ? " 
Yes, God has said this, but there are conditions under which he 
will grant our requests. One is that we should forgive others, as 
we would have God forgive us. If there is a soul on the face of 
the earth that you can't forgive, there is no use of praying. Your 
prayers will be mere mummeries. But we must follow the words 
of Christ : " If ye abide in me." Then, again, we must have faith. 
Christ tells us how we can move mountains, if we have faith. And 
the last condition I would mention is that men ought always to 
pray, and never to faint ; earnest and continued supplications bring 

the blessings. 

DISOBEDIENCE. 

All the trouble in the world originates in this little word. It 
is the cause of all misery, and is the open door through which it 
comes. It was there that Adam fell ; God told him that he 
shouldn't do a certain thing, and he did it. In the 15th chapter 
of 1st Samuel we read of sacrifices and obedience, and that God 
prefers being obeyed to having any sacrifice offered that men may 
choose. The first thing that God wants is obedience. That's 
what we want in our families. If our children disobey us there 
comes an alternative. They must learn to obey, or they or we 
must leave the house. 

It is the same with the Kingdom of God. If we enter it we 
must obey. To obey is better than making sacrifice. Saul lost 
his crown, his throne, his son, his friend Samuel, and the friend-/ 
ship of his son-in-law David; he turned his back on them all 
because of his disobedience, and he finally lost his life. But just 
turn to that other Saul in the New Testament. He was obedient 
unto death. He had no Jonathan, save at the right hand of God. 
He had no crown, no throne, but he won them both. 

31 



482 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

A blessing is promised all who will obey. God deals with 
individuals as with nations. The punishment is the same. Pun- 
ishment comes alike upon families and individuals if they will 
not obey A crisis may come when we do not know whether to 
obe}^ God or our employers, or possibly our parents. The Word 
of God makes the way clear. When we come into God's King- 
dom, " whatsoever He saith to thee, do it." If the laws of the 
nation are in conflict with God's law, they must be broken. Christ 
alone of all men obeyed God fully. Obey Him and then God 
may look down pleased with His children, and say, "This is my 
son, this is my daughter." Christ came to do God's will, and 
found in so doing it is meat and drink. 

When men disobey army orders they are court-martialed and 
shot. No one complains. Now, my friends, is there not as much 
reason why we should obey the orders of Heaven, and, when we 
do not, should we not be punished ? Sinners are willing to do any- 
thing but obey God. Coming to Him as a poor beggar is what 
they don't like. If they could buy salvation they would gladly 
do it. Some men down in Wall street, I fancy, would pay great 
prices. Many people come to me and say, " Mr. Moody, is it 
right for me to go to the theatre ; can I dance?" That ain't it. 
Can we glorify God by doing such things ? It's a good deal better 
to be right with God, and then He will look down with pleasure 

and bless us. 

HOPE. 

If I should question every one here to-day, I have no doubt 
each would be found with a hope. But is it a true or a false hope? 
If it is false it is worse than none. Job speaks about the hypo- 
crite, and says, " Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon 
him." Solomon says in Proverbs that "the hope of the unjust 
man shall perish." If you have false hopes of heaven, the best 
thing you can do is to give them up. For what are they good 
for ? Will they bear you over Jordan ? Will they sustain you 
beyond the grave ? 

But true hope is not in regard to eternal life. That is secured 
to us if we are born of God. Our hopes are of the resurrection of 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 483 

Christ, His second coming and our own resurrection. It is written, 
" He that believeth hath eternal life." 

The Lord himself shall descend from heaven, the dead shall 
be raised, and we shall meet him in the air. It is a glorious hope. 
All that believe shall rise. That is a hope sure and steadfast. 
Some one says that joy is like a lark that sings in the morning, 
but hope is like a nightingale that sings in the night. We won't 
need hope after we get to heaven. But it takes us there. You 
can have Christ and this hope to-day if you will. " He came to 
His own and His own received Him not, but as many as received 
Him to them gave He power." 

COME. 

" Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I 
will give you rest." We here find an invitation to come to Christ. 
He says, "Come unto me all." I like that word "all," because 
every one is included in it. The question ^"hat comes home to us 
all is, "Shall we come? " Some people go to Christ with their good 
deeds, pure desires, good thoughts and good name. But that isn't 
what Christ wants. He alone wants the sins of men. They are 
all that He Himself hasn't got, and He wants them. The moment 
we are willing to come to Him with our sins He will receive us. 
He will forgive and heal whoever brings his soul to him. 

God dealeth with us as we deal with our children. If your 
child does wrong, if he tells a lie, you want him to confess, and 
begin to talk with him. He may tell you he is the best scholar 
in his class, that he is obedient, and that he loves you. But that 
ain't what you want. You want him to confess that he has told a 
lie. So let us learn to come before the Saviour and confess our 
sins, laying them at the feet of Jesus. But by what right can we 
respond to this invitation? 

Suppose the Mayor of this city should invite all the Smiths 
to a banquet, and Mr. Sankey should go and try to get in on the 
plea that he was a singer. Or suppose a man should go whose 
name was Jones and who was a good scientist. Do you suppose 
they could get in when their names were not Smith ? Now, if you 



484 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

can prove that you're a sinner, this invitation from Christ applies 
to you. Don't try to prove your worthiness but your unworthi- 
ness. If you want rest, come to Christ. It can't be obtained in 
the world. You can't buy it; your friends can't give it to you; 
God don't call you without giving you the means of winning it; 
you can come if }'ou will. O, may God give you the power today. 

FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT. 

Love is the first fruit. . If we don't love our enemies we're not 
converted. We must be able to forgive others before God will for- 
give us. There is no grace in loving our friends and those who 
love us. The greatest heathen would do that. But joy is what we 
want to talk about to-day. No man is converted who hasn't it. 
The angel said, "I bring you good tidings of great joy." The 
world may give happiness, but it is fleeting. It may vanish in a 
day. 

But jo}^ comes from heaven ; it is a river, and flows on forever 
from the throne. Some people say they once had this joy, but 
have it not now. Let them turn over to the words, " Restore to 
me the jo} 7 of Thy salvation. He will do it. But remember the 
words, " Study the Word and work." A man may work and still 
not have joy, and he may study the Bible and not have it. He 
must work and study both. Then it will come, "The joy of the 
Lord is your strength." If you have joy in your heart, you can't 
help but work. Your strength will not fail you. 

There are three kinds of joy. First is the joy of our own 
salvation. How well we remember the day when we found the 
Lord! "Happy day" — how we liked to sing that hymn! Then 
there is the joy of seeing others converted. I pity those who keep 
out of the inquiry room. We who are in there get the cream of 
this work ; while you, if I may be allowed the expression, onty get 
the skimmed milk. And a third kind of joy is that which comes 
from seeing others walk in God's ways. 

In John xv., nth verse, Christ says, "These things have I 
spoken unto you, that My joy might remain with you and your 
joy might be full." That was better than if He had left us silver 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 485 

and gold. That's His legacy, His will. Yes, "My joy I leave 

with you," and thank God the devil can't get hold of it; the world 

can't take it away. How easy it is to save souls when you have 

joy in your heart. The world sees it in our faces. Last night we 

had the most extraordinary meeting that has been held. It was 

the grandest impression I have had in this city, to see those 

young men standing up. Ah, the joy of Christ was on their 

faces. 

WHAT IS IT TO BELIEVE ON CHRIST? 

If Christ was not divine, He was not a Saviour, and we are 
man-worshippers ; all our hopes are gone, and our faith is vain. 
Matthew wrote to prove that Christ is the true Messiah, the Son 
of David. Mark begins with Malachi, where the Old Testament 
leaves off. Luke begins with Zachariah. But John sweeps over 
them all, and goes back to the bosom of God, and brings Christ 
from the throne. The nth and 12th verses of the fourth chapter 
of John are, to me, two of the most precious in the Bible, 
they are about worn out in my Bible with use : "And He came 
unto His own, and His own received Him not ; but unto such as 
believed on Him, to them gave He power." Mark the "Him." 
There is no creed, no denomination, no system required. There 
is not a soul here but can take Him to-day if it will. "Whomso- 
ever" has been said, and it means all mankind. We have the 
best reasons to believe that this religion is true. How could hun- 
dreds of thousands of Christians have found so much comfort in 
Christ if it were all a myth ? See how men have been elevated 
and lifted up. Let us only take God at His word and we will 
be saved. 

Last night in the young men's meeting, a young man stood 
up and told how he had been saved three years ago ; how his 
mother and sisters had all given him up, and the Lord reached 
down and lifted him into life. Isn't this proof of the Lord's power ? 
All who find Christ tell the same story, be they Americans, Eng- 
lish, Germans, Chinese, or of other nationality. What more proof 
do you want than this, and the ages that this religion has been a 
Gospel of peace and joy to thousands of suffering souls. 



486 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

There is much discussion nowadays about miracles. But 
isn't a conversion a miracle? John's Gospel is the great one. 
Believe, believe, believe, he says. That idea is ever before him. 
Every chapter but two in his writings mentions it. God don't tell 
you to feel ; many say they don't feel right to come to Christ. 
God tells you to believe. You must trust Him first. You must 
have faith in Him before you can have Christian experience. 
"Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him;" that's it. If He 
don't save us, who can? All the churches and priests in the world 
can't do it. Now let us pray that all the unbelief in this building 
may be swept away. 

PRAISE. 

We have a blessed subject to-day — "Praise." I think this is 
the first praise meeting we have had. We have been praying a 
great deal, and now let us praise God. There is much more 
said in the Bible about praise than about prayer. The Psalms 
are nothing but praise, and as David got nearer the end of his 
journey he seems to have thought of little else. So it is with 
Christians — the nearer they get to heaven the more they praise 
God. The saints praise Him in heaven, and men should learn 
how to praise Him here below. Everything that God has created, 
except the heart of man, praises Him. The sun, moon, and stars 
praise Him, and O, let us praise Him. 

I knew a man who always used to praise God under any cir- 
cumstances. One day he came in with a severe cut on his finger, 
and said, "I have cut my finger. Praise God! I didn't cut it off." 
Under all circumstances let us praise God that our misfortunes 
are no worse. Let us ask Him to help us to praise Him. If we 
only had more of these praise meetings, I think it wouldn't 
be long before a glorious revival would sweep through all the 
churches. Forget your troubles, and begin to praise God to-day. 

CHRIST MIGHTY TO SAVE. 

The keynote of this meeting is the sentiment of that hymn — 
"Christ mighty to save." I have had considerable experience 
with men enslaved by strong drink. They try often to reform, 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 487 

but seldom succeed alone. The reason is that they have too much 
confidence in their own strength. When they give that up, and 
learn to trust alone in Christ, they are saved. When they call 
on God for help, the}' always get it. If we could only save our- 
selves by our own strength there would be no need of a Saviour. 
The w r orst enemy man has is himself. His pride and self-confi- 
dence often ruin him. They keep him from trusting to the 
arms of a loving Saviour. We are wicked by our nature ; there 
is nothing good in us; the Bible teaches us that all the way 
through. 

David in the Psalms said: "There is none that doeth good; 
no, not one." He was right. We are all evil in our nature. It is 
the old Adam. I tell you man without God is a failure, and a tre- 
mendous failure. There's nothing good in him. It is a great deal 
better to believe God than to hope for salvation through your own 
poor exertions. 

How many times have you resolved to break off from some 
habit and failed ! The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked. 
What we want is a new creation. Don't try to patch, up your old 
natures. We want to be regenerated. 

PROMISES OF THE BIBLE. 

There was a man in London who had all the promises of God 
printed together in a little book, and some time after some one in 
the country sent up for a copy. He .received the answer that all 
the promises of God were out of print — perhaps that man had never 
heard of this : (holding up a Bible). At one time in Chicago, 
when the meetings grew a little dull, I told them we would go 
through the Bible and look for all the promises given to us ; and 
from that time there were no more dull meetings. We had never 
realized before what promises God has made to those who believe 
in Jesus Christ. 

In the West I met a man in the cars who was marking a lot 
of notes he had in his hand with the letters B., G., P., and so on, 
and I asked him what it was for. He said sonic of them were bad, 
the parties bankrupt, and he never expected to collect them. Some 



488 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

were good, though the men were slow to pay, and some were only 
possibly good, and he marked them to calculate his chances. Now 
some people are just like this with God's promises; some they 
expect will be kept, and some they do not ; some are barely possi- 
ble. I advise you to make all God's promises good. God always 
keeps every promise He makes, and I defy any infidel to show 
any promise He has not kept. 

PEACE. 

The Gospel is a Gospel of peace, and our God is a God of 
peace, not of contention. The wicked know nothing of peace. 
There is no peace, saith the Lord, for the wicked ; they are like 
the troubled sea — but you don't need to go to the Bible to find 
that out ; if you look around you you will see it. If you have 
not got peace, it is a sure sign you have not found the true God, 
for the peace of God will keep your hearts and minds if you have 
found Him. 

Look in the 6th chapter of Numbers, 26th verse : " The Lord 
lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace." The 
Lord will keep thee ; the Lord will give thee peace ; the Lord will 
bless thee — blessing at the foundation, blessing on the top, peace 
in the middle, solid, real peace such as the world cannot give or 
take away. When a man has left a will, how eagerly we read it ! 
We don't care much for a dry law paper, but if it has got our 
name in it with a legacy we never find it dry. 

Now God says, " My peace I leave with you." Oh, child of 
God, have you got it? None of us have enough of it. I get 
angry and disturbed and make a fool of myself very often ; I wish 
I had peace enough to keep me from it, but God gives good meas- 
ure. Let our hearts be open to receive the peace of God. 

AFFLICTION. 

You will find in the 119th Psalm, 67th verse, these words : 
" Before I was afflicted I went astray ; but now have I kept Thy 
word ;" and again, in the 71st verse : "It is good for me that I 
have been afflicted, that I might learn Thy statutes." We can 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 489 

stand affliction better than we can prosperity, for in prosperity we 
forget God. When our work is light, our prospects good, and 
everything looks smooth and easy, we are more apt to give our- 
selves over to pleasure. Somebody said : " It is the dead level of 
affairs that make us go to ruin." 

A great many have a wrong idea of God, and think he sends 
afflictions because He don't love them ; they think that because 
they don't know Him. He sends afflictions to humble our hearts 
and make us look to Him, and because He loves us, so he cannot 
let us leave Him and forget Him. Mr. Moody read a letter from 
from a young lady in London, who would not go to the meetings 
when he was there for fear she might be converted, but who, 
since then, had been brought to God through suffering. 

HOPE FOR THE INEBRIATE. 

There is no day in the week when I feel my weakness so 
much as on Friday. We can do nothing. If these men get liberty, 
it is by the power of God. If you will turn to the third chapter 
of Acts, you will read the story of the lame man whom Peter 
restored, and who followed him into the temple. When the people 
saw it they ran together greatly wondering, and probably when 
John saw this he said to Peter, "Now, Peter, it would be a good time 
for you to preach." And Peter said, " Ye men of Irsael, why marvel 
ye at this ? or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our 
own power or holiness we had made this man to walk ? It was 
faith in God's name which made this man strong, whom ye see 
and know." 

The man had been blind from his birth, but he walked around, 
crying and shaking himself in the temple. If we had seen him, 
we would have thought he was a shouting Methodist with his 
hallelujahs and amens. It was by Christ's power, not by his 
own, that Peter did this thing. So it is with us. Many ask : 
" Can these drunkards be saved?" I tell you only by Christ; 
if God gives them power they will be saved. 

We are living in the days of miracles now. These intem- 
perate men are only converted by a miracle. They may be over- 



490 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

taken by a fault, but if they are, let us go and Help them up again ; 
it is no sign that they have not been converted because their faults 
overtake them afterward ; it is so with all of us. What we do 
must be done in Christ's name. We might as well have an icicle 
in the pulpit as a man who leaves Christ out. Tons of such mere 
intellectual sermons do no good. If these men will get Christ they 
can resist temptation ; otherwise they cannot. 

BELIEF IN GOD. 

I have believed in God for many years. When first converted 
I did not believe in Him very much, but ever since then I have 
believed in Him more and more every year. When people come 
to me, tell me they can't believe, and ask what they shall do, I tell 
them to do as I once knew a man do : He went and knelt down 
and told God honestly he could not believe in Him, and I advise 
them to go off alone and tell it right out to the Lord. But if you 
stop to ask yourself why you don't believe in Him, is there really 
any reason ? People read infidel books and wonder why they are 
unbelievers, I ask why they read such books. They think they 
must read both sides. I say that book is a lie, how can it be one 
side when it is a lie ? It is not one side at all. 

Suppose a man tells right down lies about my family, and I 
read them so as to hear both sides ; it would not be long before 
some suspicion would creep into my mind. I said to a man once, 
"Have you got a wife?" "Yes, and a good one." I asked : "Now 
what if I should come to you and cast out insinuations against 
her ? " And he said, "Well your life would not be safe long if you 
did." I told him just to treat the devil as he would treat a man 
who went around with such stories. We are not to blame for 
having doubts flitting through our minds, but for harboring them. 
Let us go out trusting the Lord with heart and soul to-day. 

HE CAME TO SAVE SINNERS. 

"They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are 

sick. I come not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." 

In his short address Mr, Moody said : Matthew, Mark, and 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 401 

Luke all give an account of this saying of Christ's, that He came 
to save sinners. Sin may keep us out of heaven, but cannot keep 
us from coming to Christ. Christ was a physician ; He came to 
save sinners, and He never lost a case that was brought to him. 
If you should call a physician to see a friend and he should go 
and find that man was perfectly well, he would be indignant, 
wouldn't he? 

I remember when I was in Chicago, seeing the advertisement 
of a patent medicine stuck all round on houses and rocks and 
fences. "Pain Killer! Pain Killer! Pain Killer!" and I thought, 
"there is a man who is bound to make some money." I hadn't 
any pain I wanted cured, so I did not pay any attention to it. But 
one morning when Spring came I had a headache, and when I 
saw that this pain killer would cure headache I bought a bottle. 
Men don't want a doctor until they are sick, and don't go to Christ 
until they feel their need of Him. It is no use to offer bread to a 
man who is not hungry, or water to a man who is not thirsty. 
"They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick." 
Paul said he was the chief of sinners, and if the chief is saved, 
there is hope for every sinner. 

JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA. 

What I want to call attention to this morning is how one act 
done for Christ, with a pure motive, will live forever. All four of 
the disciples give an account of this deed. Joseph of Arimathea, 
was a rich man and a counsellor, a good and just man, and John 
tells us he had long been a secret disciple of Christ. He had 
never come out boldly for fear of the Jews, but in that hour, when 
all had deserted Him and one had betrayed Him, the death of 
Christ brought Joseph out, and he alone came forward to care for 
the crucified body. It is the death of Christ which should enlist 
us all. The fact that He died for us should make us all come 
forward to advance His kingdom. Joseph had been opposed to 
the death of Jesus, but he had taken no part in His trial and cru- 
cifixion. Dr. Bonner says, when you have a trial before a com- 
mittee and one of its members will oppose the measure you want 



492 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

to carry you don't send for him — you have the meeting without 
him if you can. 

So when this matter came up before the Sanhedrin, Joseph 
was not there and was not sent for. It is only when Christ is dead 
upon the cross that Joseph comes forward as a disciple and begs 
the body of Pilate — an act which has lived nearly one thousand 
nine hundred years, and which will continue to live throughout 
all time. Matthew, Mark, and Luke do not tell us where Joseph 
got the myrrh and aloes, but John tells us that Nicodemus brought 
a hundred pounds weight, and that they put linen clothes upon 
the body of Jesus, with the spices, and laid it in a new sepulchre 
wherein was never man yet laid. It was a tomb Joseph had built 
for himself, expecting to lie there some day, but he probably 
thought the sepulchre would be all the sweeter if Christ had laid 
there. When we go away from here, let us see what we can do for 
the sake of Jesus, what acts that deserve to live. 

LOSING SIGHT OF SELF. 

Mr. Moody read the 9th chapter of Mark. He said : There is 
no doubt but hundreds of Christians who have attended these 
meetings wonder how they can now go out and work for the Lord. 
There is one thing necessary first, and that is, we must lose our- 
selves and think only of duty. In this chapter which I have just 
read, we learn how the disciples had disputed among themselves 
who should be the greatest ; but Christ said to them, " If any man 
desire to be first, the same shall be last of all and servant of all." 
If a man wants to become wise before God, he must be willing to 
appear a fool before the world. God don't want our wisdom ; He 
wants our ignorance. We read in the 10th chapter of Mark and 
31st verse, "But many that are first shall be last, and the last first." 

Then Jesus tells of seven things that are going to happen in 
reference to His death. " The Son of Man shall be delivered unto 
the chief priests, and they shall condemn Him to death, and shall 
deliver Him to the Gentiles ; and they shall mock Him, and shall 
scourge Him, and shall spit upon Him, and shall kill Him, and the 
third day He shall rise again." This was a prophecy, and I have 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 493 

an idea that many things which wc still think are visionary will 
literally take place at some remote time. Yet right after this 
prophecy the disciples said to Him, u Master, we wonld that Thon 
shonldst do for us whatsoever we shall desire." 

Here is self again, and always self. It was the dying request 
of Christ that we should eat of the bread and drink of the wine in 
remembrance of Him ; yet many young converts say to me, " I 
ueed not go to the communion table, need I ? " I tell them they 
need not go unless they want to, but if that was the dying request 
of any friend they had they would be willing to do it all their lives; 
why, then, should they not desire to do it in remembrance of their 
Saviour ? They never thought of it in that way, they say. We 
want to be remembered in Heaven, and Christ wants to be remem- 
bered here. We must pray to God to fill us with this spirit, and 
help us get rid of self ; and never let us stop and try to think who 

shall be greatest. 

TRUE FRIENDSHIP. 

We read in the xv. chapter of II. Samuel that David was flee- 
ing in exile from Jerusalem. Absalom had already undermined 
his power and superseded him on the throne. But as David went 
through the gate six hundred men passed on before him, and the 
king said to Ittai, the leader: " Wherefore goest thou also with us ; 
return to thy place and abide with the king, for thou art a stranger 
and also an exile." And Ittai answered the king and said, " As 
the Lord liveth, and as my lord the king liveth, surely in what 
place my lord the king shall be, whether in death or life, even there 
also will thy servant be." 

There was another man, too, called Hushai, who went out to 
meet the king, but he returned again to the city. How it must 
have pleased Dayid to have found Ittai outside the gate. Ittai is 
worth thousands of Hushais. David did not know who his friends 
were until trouble came. There was true fellowship, true love in 
that act. In time of distress Ittai would not desert his king, but 
followed him into exile. So it should be in the church. That is 
just what Christ looks for; the only thing which can please Him 
is the true love that will leave all to follow Him. 



494 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Some people do not know the meaning of the word fellowship 
— it means partnership. Onr partnership is with Christ the Son, 
and when we come into it everything we have belong to the firm ; 
we can do nothing by ourselves without consulting Christ. We 
must be like Ittai, willing to leave the city and all we possess, if 
necessary, to follow him. 

OUR REFUGE. 

I want to call your attention to the six cities of refuge appointed 
by Joshua for the children of Israel. These cities were set apart 
that all men who killed any person unawares or unwillingly, and 
without hatred, might flee to them and be safe within their gates. 
The magistrates had to see to it that guide-boards were put up, 
stones cleared away, and the road kept clear for those who fled 
for their lives from the avengers of blood. These ancient cities 
of refuge are in our da}' represented by Christ. He is our refuge 
in all times of trouble. 

The names of the cities are Hebrew, and all have a meaning. 
Kedish means holiness. If we flee to this city of refuge we will 
be made holy. Had Christ committed sin we could have no hope, 
but since He is without sin, if Ave are in Christ we are made per- 
fect. Shechem meant shoulder, which means strength and power. 
If a man needs strength he must flee there. Sins are in one of 
two places, on us or on Christ. If we are weak we must find 
strength in Shechem. Hebron means joined. If we can get there 
we are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Beser means fortified; you 
are secured there if you want to get away from the world. Ramoth 
means heights, and Golan means exile — exile in this world and 
citizenship in heaven. 

These six cities ought to be a help to you. Have we Christ 
for our refuge? If a man is away from God what hope has he? It 
is follv for a man who has an appetite for drink to try and over- 
come it by himself; he can't overcome both his appetite and the 
devil alone. It is only through Christ that we can be secure. 
This is what a great many people forget, and so they sign the 
pledge, and next da}' are as drunk as ever. 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 495 

THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

If we have the Spirit, we have the fruit of the Spirit. If the 
Spirit of God is in us, we will have these qualities of His Spirit. 
4k He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love." Some 
one said to me the other day that he understood about belief, but 
could not understand w r hat it was to be born again. I told him 
that he that believeth had life eternal, and whoever received life 
through Christ was born again. A man cannot get that life by 
merely going to church and observing forms ; he must get the 
Spirit of God, and then he will have light and peace. We have 
no peace so long as we have sin, but if we accept Christ, and salva- 
tion through Him, our sins are blotted out, and we have peace in 
reviewing the past. 

Spiritual power is what we want next. As soon as the Holy 
Ghost comes we want boldness to go out and proclaim Jesus. There 
was once a man on trial for his life. The king of the country in 
which lie lived said the law must take its course, but, after lie was 
tried and condemned, he would pardon him. The man was cool 
all through his trial, and when they brought in a verdict of guilty, 
the man was perfectly unconcerned. So with the Christian. He 
will have boldness in his heart on the day of judgment, because he 
knows Christ became a propitiation for his sins and he has his 
pardon laid up in his heart. 

ONF THING THOU LACKEST. 

The thought I want to call your attention to is, that here is a 
man wno seems to be good enough without Christ. Cornelius, we 
are told, was devout, just, benevolent, of good report among all 
nations, and a man who feared God. What more could you ask? 
What did he lack? He needed Christ. I don't care how good a 
man may be, he needs a Saviour. We ought to be interested in 
this account of the conversion of Cornelius, for if he needed it, we 
all need it, every man in this city needs it. 

It is recorded that the angel of God appeared to Cornelius and 
told him to send to Joppa for Peter that he might come to his house 
and tell them words whereby they might be saved. And Cornelius 



496 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

sent three men and Peter returned with them to Cesarea. We all 
ought to want to know what the message was that the disciple 
brought. What was necessary for the salvation of so good a man 
is necessary for us all. Here in this chapter we have it all. Peter 
taught everywhere Christ. And in the 38th verse we read, "How 
God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with 
power, who went about doing good, and healing all that were 
oppressed of the devil, for God was with him." 

You may be everything that is estimable, but if you don't 
believe in Jesus Christ and receive remission of your sins, you 
cannot see heaven. Under that preaching of Peter's Cornelius 
and his whole family were converted. The Holy Ghost fell upon 
the meeting, and it was a good net that the disciple drew in that 
day. Let us pray that we may receive the Spirit as they did. 

THREE CLASSES. 

I always notice many here at noon whom we have met in the 
inquiry rooms, and I want to speak a word to them. There are 
three classes of people who will not accept salvation — those who 
neglect it, those who refuse it, and those who despise it. Many 
think they are not so bad as the scoffer at religion because they 
only neglect it, but if they keep on they are lost just the same. 
Suppose there is a man in a boat going in a swift current down the 
stream ; if he neglects to pull for the shore he is a doomed man. 
He will go over the rapids, won't he? 

If Noah had neglected to go into the ark after he had built it, 
he would have been lost with the other antediluvians. Nothing 
could have saved him. You let the cry be raised that this build- 
ing is on fire, and see how many will keep their seats ? they would 
be burned up as sure as they did. 

Then again in the 12th chapter of Hebrews, 25th verse, " See 
that ye refuse not him that speaketh." The next step is to refuse 
salvation. A while ago they only neglected it, now they refuse it 
— that is the second round of the ladder. You can only do one of 
two things, take it or refuse it. You have all been in a house 
where the waiter passed ice-water to a number of people sitting 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 4rf 

together, and seen how some would take it and some would not ; 
so the cup of salvation is passed among you to-day. How many 
of you will accept it? Are you almost persuaded? Remember a 
hair's breath from heaven is not an inch from hell. Don't stop 
where you are. 

Again, in the ioth chapter of Hebrews, 28th verse, we 
read: u He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under 
two or three witnesses." Many despise the whole thing, hate it, 
and will have none of it — give them a tract and they light their 
cigars with it. There are the three words — neglect, refuse, 
despise. When there is but one engine and three cars attached, 
don't they all go the same way ? If you do either of these three 
things, you must suffer the eternal consequences. 

"SEVEN COMES." 

The keynote for the service to-day is found in the little word 
come. I would like to speak to you of seven instances where we 
are invited to come to the Lord. In the 55th chapter of Isaiah 
and 1 st verse we read, "Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to 
the waters," and again in the third verse, " Incline your ear and 
come unto me; hear and your soul shall live." People are so 
engrossed with the affairs of this world that but few find time to 
stop. It is all rush and hurry, and they don't think about their 
souls. 

I was out to dinner yesterday, and -they were trying there to 
teach a little child to walk. They would say to her, "Come," and 
she would try to go a few steps. So Christ is calling the world 
to come, but the trouble is they do not heed and won't go. After 
the Chicago fire, when such quantities of money, clothes and pro- 
visions were sent there, the only question asked those who applied 
for assistance was: "Were you burned out?" If they could 
prove it they got help. All you have to do is to show that you 
want help from God, and He will give it. In the 1st of Isaiah 
we find : " Come, now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord ; 
though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow." Sin 
can keep us out of heaven, but not out of Christ.. If you are out 

32 



498 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

of Christ, decide now to come to Him. As the old colored woman 
said, when she made np her mind : "Then she was there." 

Will yon tnrn to the 6th chapter of Mark and 31st verse? 
Christ said to his disciples, "Come ye yonrselves apart into a 
desert place, and rest awhile." It is a good thing to be alone with 
God. We lead two lives — one in the world and one apart with 
God. In the nth chapter of Matthew is the invitation, "Come 
nnto me all ye that labor." If any man or woman among yon is 
carrying a bnrden, take it to Christ. In the last verse of the 4th 
chapter of Hebrews we are told to come boldly to the throne of 
grace. Those who are afraid to become Christians lest they can't 
hold ont, shonld remember that at the Throne we can find grace 
in time of need. 

The next come is in the 2 2d chapter of Matthew and 4th verse : 
"Come nnto the marriage" — the parable of the marriage of the 
king's son. The seventh and last invitation I want to call yonr 
attention to is, " Come and inherit eternal life. " " Come np hither. ' ' 
These are blessed words, which will last forever. 

STORY OF LITTLE SAMMY. 

When I was in Glasgow a lady said to me, "You use that 
word 'take' very frequently. Is there anything of that kind in 
the Bible? I can't find it. I think you must have manufactured 
that word." Why, in the Bible it says : "The Spirit and the bride 
say come. Let him that heareth say come ; let him that is athirst, 
come ; and whosoever will, let him 'take' of the water of life freely." 
And if God says let him take, He will supply him. If that boy will 
take Christ, who can stop him ? All hell and all earth cannot stop 
him. If need be, God would send ten thousand legions of angels to 
help him on his way up. I tell you, if you are not saved, it is 
because you won't. You will not come unto Him that you may 
have life. The door hangs on that hinge. 

If a man says, "I will rise and go to Him," it won't wait. 
When the prodigal came home it wasn't when he got home that 
the change took place. It was away, away off in that foreign coun- 
try , when he said, "I will arise and go to my father." I think 




MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 490 

with men the turning point will be when they say, "I will come, 
for I want to." If you want to go to heaven, the first thing is to 
make up your mind to go. If I want to go to Chicago, the first 
thing I do is to make up my mind to go. And if you are willing 
to go to Christ, there is no power on earth can keep you away. 
Now, these men who say they can't come, just be honest and put 
in the right word and say you won't come. 

At one time my sister had trouble with her little boy, and the 
father said, "Why, Sammy, you must go now and ask your mother's 
forgiveness." The little fellow said he wouldn't. The father says, 
"You must. If you don't go and ask your mother's forgiveness I 
shall have to undress you and put you to bed." He was a bright, 
nervous little fellow, never still a moment, and the father thought 
he would have such a dread of being undressed and put to bed. 
But the little fellow wouldn't, so they undressed him and put him 
to bed. The father went to his business, and when he came home 
at noon he said to his wife: "Has Sammy asked your forgive- 
ness?" "No," she said, "he hasn't." So the father went to him 
and said, "Why, Sammy, why don't you ask your mother's for- 
giveness?" The little fellow shook his head, "Won't do it." 
"But, Sammy, you have got to." "Couldn't." 

The father went down to his ofiice, and stayed all the after- 
noon, and when he came home he asked his wife, "Has Sammy 
asked your forgiveness ?" " No, I took something up to him and 
tried to have him eat, but he wouldn't." So the father went up 
to see him, and said, "Now, Sammy, just ask your mother's for- 
giveness, and you may be dressed and come down to supper with 
us." "Couldn't do it." The father coaxed, but the little fellow 
"couldn't do it." That was all they could get out of him. You 
know very well he could, but he didn't want to. Now, the hardest 
thing a man has to do is to become a Christian, and it is the easi- 
est. That may seem a contradiction, but it isn't. The hard point 
is because he don't want to. The hardest thing for a man to do 
is to give up his will. 

That night they retired, and they thought surely early in the 
morning he will be up ready to ask his mother's forgiveness. The 



500 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

father went to him — that was Friday morning — to see if he was 

ready to ask his mother's forgiveness, but he "couldn't." The 

father and mother felt so bad about it they couldn't eat ; they 

thought it was to darken their whole life. Perhaps that boy thought 

that father and mother didn't love him. Just what many sinners 

think because God won't let them have their own way. The father 

went to his business, and when he came home he said to his wife, 

"Has Sammy asked your forgiveness?" "No." So he went to 

the little fellow and said, "Now, Sammy, are you not going to ask 

your mother's forgiveness?" "Can't," and that was all they could 

get out of him. 

The father couldn't eat any dinner, it was like death in the 

house. It seemed as if the boy was going to conquer his father 

and mother. Instead of his little will being broken, it looked very 

much as if he was going to break theirs. Late Friday afternoon, 

"Mother, mother, forgive," says Sammy — "me." As the little 

fellow said "me," he sprang to his feet and said: "I have said it, 

I have said it. Now dress me, and take me down to see father. 

He will be so glad to know I have said it." And she took him 

down, and when the little fellow came in he said, "I've said it, I've 

said it." Oh, my friends, it is so easy to say, "I will arise and go 

to my God." It is the most reasonable thing you can do. Isn't 

it an unreasonable thing to hold out? Come right to God just 

this very hour. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 

shalt be saved." And now this night believe, and thou shalt 

be saved. 

LOVE CAN CONQUER. 

A Sunday-school superintendent I knew had a boy in his 
school that nearly broke it up. He put him under one teacher 
and nothing could be done with him : he put him under another 
teacher, land nothing could be done with him ; and he made up his 
mind to expel him from the school, and do it publicly, and let all 
the school know that the boy was expelled. But there came a 
lady teacher to him who said : "I wish you would let me have 
that boy." "But," said he, "he is such a bad boy ; he uses such 
vulgar language. All those men can't do anything with him, 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 501 

and I think I am sure yon can't 7 ' The lady said, "I am not 
doing much for Christ, and it may be that I can win him." But 
she was a lady of refined society, and he thought, "Surely she 
won't be willing to have patience with that boy." 

He gave her the boy, and, he said, for a few Sundays he 
behaved very well, bnt one Sunday he bebaved badly, and she 
corrected him, and he up and spat in her face. She quietly took 
her handkerchief and wiped her face. I don't know what his 
name was, but we will call him Johnny. "Johnny," she says, " I 
wish you would go home with me. I want to talk with you." 
6i Well, I won't,', he said, "I won't be seen on the street with you, 
and what's more I ain't never coming to this Sunday-school any 
more." "Well," she says, "If you won't walk home with me, let 
me walk home with you." 

No, he said he wouldn't be seen on the street with her, and 
he was not coming to that dirty old Sunday-school any more. She 
knew if she was going to reach that boy she must do it then, and 
she thought she would try. She thought she would just bear on 
that cnriosity chord. Sometimes when you can't reach people in 
any other way, you do it by exciting their curiosity. She said to 
him : "If you will come to my house next Tuesday morning I 
shan't be there, but if you will go there and ring the front door 
bell and tell the servant there is a little bundle on the bureau for 
you, she will give it to yon." The little fellow said he wouldn't 
come. She thought he might change his mind. He thought it 
over, and he thought he would just like to know what there was 
in that bundle. 

And he went np to the house Tuesday morning and the 
bundle was handed to him ; and there was a little vest in it and a 
little necktie that she had made with her own hands, and a kind 
note stating that ever since he had been in her class she had been 
praying for him every morning and every evening, and she told 
him how she loved him and cared for him. The next 
morning he was there, bright and early, before she was up. 
The servant came up and told her that the boy was in the draw- 
ing room and wanted to see her. She went down, and found the 



502 MOODY 1 S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

little fellow sitting on the sofa weeping. She spoke to him kindly, 
and said, "What is the trouble?" and he says, " O, teacher, I 
have had no peace since I got that note from you." And she got 
down and prayed with him. " And," said the superintendent, 
" there is not a better boy in the school. Love conquered him. 

BEWARE OF PICKPOCKETS. 

When I was in England my little girl said, " Papa, why don't 
those colored people wash themselves white?" You might as well 
try to make yourselves pure and holy without the help of God. It 
would be just as easy for you to do that as for that black man to 
wash himself white. The Ethiopian cannot change his skin, 
neither can the leopard change his spots. A man might just as 
well try to leap over the moon as to serve God in the flesh. There- 
fore that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born 
of the spirit is spirit. Now God tells us in this chapter how we 
are to get into His kingdom. We are not to work our way in, 
not but that salvation is worth working for. We admit all that. 
If there were rivers and mountains in the way, it would be worth 
swimming those rivers and climbing those mountains. 

There is no doubt that salvation is worth all that, but we don't 
get it by our works. It is to him that worketh not, but believeth. 
We work because we are saved; we don't work to be saved. We 
work from the Cross but not towards it. Now it is written, " Work 
out your salvation with fear and trembling." Why, you must have 
your salvation before you can work it out. Suppose I say to my 
little boy, " Go and work out that garden," I must furnish him the 
garden before he can work it out. Suppose I say to him, " I want 
you to spend that $100 carefully." " Well," he says, " let me 
have that $100 and I will be careful how I spend it." 

I remember when I first left home and went to Boston, I had 
spent all my money, and I went to the post office three times a 
day. I knew there was only one mail a day from home, but I 
thought that by some possibility there might be a letter for me. 
At last I got a letter from my little sister, and I was awful glad to 
get it. She had heard that there were a great many pickpockets 



MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. r>()'.\ 

in Boston, and a large part of that letter was to have me be very 
careful not to let anybody pick my pocket. Now, I had got to 
have something in my pocket in order to have it picked. So yon 
have got to have salvation before you can work it out. 

MUST BELIEVE MY OWN EYES. 

There are a great many things that I can't explain, and that 
I can't reason out, that I believe. I heard a commercial traveller 
say that he had heard that the ministry and religion of Jesus 
Christ was a matter of revelation and not investigation. " When 
it pleased God to reveal His Son to me," says Paul. There were 
a party of young men together, and these men went back to the 
country, and on their journey they made up their minds not to 
believe anything they could not reason out. An old man heard 
them, and presently he said, "I heard you say you would not 
believe anything you could not reason out." 

"Yes," they said, "that was so." 

"Well," he said, "coming down on the train to-day I noticed 
some geese, some sheep, some swine, and some cattle, all eating 
grass. Can you tell me by what process that same grass was 
turned into hair, feathers, bristles and wool ? Do you believe 
it is a fact?" 

"Oh, yes," they said, "we can't help believing that, though 
we fail to see it." 

"Well," said the old man, "I can't help believing in Jesus 
Christ." 

I can't help believing in the regeneration of man wnen I 
see men that have been reclaimed ; I see men that have been 
reformed. Haven't some of the very worst men in the city been 
regenerated — picked up out of the pit and their feet put upon the 
rock and a new song put in their mouth ? It was cursing and 
blaspheming, and now it is praising God. Old things have passed 
away and all things have become new; not reformed only, but 
regenerated — a new man in Christ Jesus. 

Look you, down there in the dark alleys of this city is a poor 
drunkard. I think if you want to get near hell, go to a poor 



504 MOODY'S ILLUSTRATIONS. 

drunkard's home. Go to the house of that poor miserable drunk- 
ard. Is there anything nearer like hell on earth ? See the want anp 
distress that reign there. But hark ! A footstep is heard at the 
door, and the children run and hide themselves. The patient wife 
waits to meet him. The man has been her torment. Many a 
time she has borne about for weeks the marks of blows. Many a 
time that strong right hand has been brought down on her 
defenseless head. 

And now she waits expecting to hear his oaths and suffer his 
brutal treatment. He comes in and says to her, " I have been to 
the meeting, and I heard there that if I will I can be converted. I 
believe that God is able to save me." Go down to that 
house again in a few weeks and what a change ! As you 
approach you hear some one singing. It is not the song of a revel- 
ler, but they are singing the "Rock of Ages." The children are 
no longer afraid of him, but cluster around his knee. His wife is 
near him, her face lit up with a happy glow. Is not that a picture 
of regeneration ? I can take you to thousands of such homes, made 
happy by the regenerating power of the religion of Christ. What 
men want is the power to overcome temptation, the power to lead a 
right life. 



APPENDIX. 



Graphic Account of Mr. Moody's Home Life and Death. 

THE following interesting letter is from Dr. N. P. Wood, of 
Northfield, Mr. Moody's family physician. This letter and 
the graphic account of Mr. Moody's home life appear exclusively 
in Rev. Dr. Northrop's "Life of Moody." 

OFFICE OF 

N. P. WOOD, M. D., 
127 MAIN ST. 

Northfield, Mass., Jan. 20th, 1900. 
u Dear Sir: 

" With regard to a photograph of Mr. Moody, you have the 
one to which I referred, viz. : the one where he is sitting in an 
open wagon holding the reins. The conversation to which I 
referred was as follows : About two hours before Mr. Moody's 
death, after some conversation with various members of his own 
family, he turned to me and said, ' Dr. Wood, I have always been 
an ambitious man ; not ambitious to leave my children a lot of 
money, but ambitious to leave them plenty of work to do. Now, 
I want to make my will.' (Here he made a short pause.) ' I will 
the care of Hermon School to Will ' (his elder son). ' I will the 
care of the Chicago Institute to Percy ' (his son-in-law), ' and I will 
the care of the Seminary to Paul ' (his younger son) ' and George ' 
(his favorite brother). ' And I want Ambert to be their business 
agent.' Ambert is his brother George's son, who has acted as 
general agent for Mr. Moody for several years in regard to the 
schools in Northfield. 

" The article which I enclose gives glimpses of Mr Moody's 
home-life in Northfield. The conversation that I have recorded 
is almost exactly verbatim." 

505 



506 APPENDIX. 

The old proverb, " A prophet is not without honor save in his 
own country," cannot be said of D. L. Moody, for surely no person 
could be more sincerely loved and honored by his townsmen than 
was he. Expressions of sorrow are heard from all classes of peo- 
ple in the town, and could each tribute be represented by a blos- 
som on his grave it would be piled high with flowers. His towns- 
men have been proud of him as a citizen, as a man, and as a reli- 
gious worker. Although not all of them have endorsed his religious 
belief, they have thoroughly believed in his honesty of purpose 
and sincerity, and are convinced that the results of his life-work 
will be lasting and of inestimable value to future generations. 

GREAT IMPROVEMENTS AT NORTHFIELD. 

They know that Northfield has been changed from a quiet 
farming town, with corresponding advantages, to a thrifty village, 
with a steady growth, and that there and at Mount Hermon have 
been established two of the best preparatory schools in the State, 
all through the energy and perseverance of this man. Every 
effort has been made by him to bring these schools within the 
reach of the boys and girls of the town, and many an ambitions 
father and mother have been able to educate their children through 
his efforts. 

A few months before his death he was told of a woman 
who was supporting her family taking in washing, and that her 
daughter was ready for the Seminary ; but she almost despaired 
of her ability to send her there. Mr. Moody instantly replied : 
" Tell the principal to put her on the free list and place her in the 
building; the town girls must be helped first." This is only one 
instance of many similar ones. Under certain provisions, a few 
years ago, he offered every Northfield boy free tuition for the first 
year at Mount Hermon, and several boys availed themselves of 
this opportunity each year afterward. 

He was instantly alert and ready with money and work to 
forward any plans being made to benefit the town. At the time 
the village Improvement Society was formed, he subscribed $100 
for work to improve the street, knowing that it would be expended 






APPENDIX. 607 

in a part of the village remote from the school or his residence. 
Everv year after its formation he gave generously of money, also 
offered valuable advice and wise suggestions. When the kinder- 
garten was started in the town a piano was much needed for the 
work. Mr. Moody knowing of this, gave the school one if the 
committee would move it and have it tuned. 

SEMINARY HILL IN JUNE SPLENDOR. 

He was very proud of the magnificent trees of the village and 
nothing irritated him more than any attempt to injure them. One 
day observing a tree in the yard of a friend which had been seri- 
ously injured by a horse being tied to it, he said to the woman, 
"Tell your husband he would be justified in knocking the man 
down who should deliberately injure so beautiful a tree." He 
caused to be set a large number of trees and shrubs about his 
place and on the Seminary grounds. It must have been very 
gratifying for him to see Seminary Hill in all its June splendor, 
knowing that in his childhood it was considered one of the most 
barren places in town, one old man having told the writer that 
"that side hill wouldn't bear white beans." He was a kind 
neighbor, sickness and trouble finding him ready with sympathy 
and material help. Delicacies of his garden and fruit orchard 
found their way into many a humble home. He encouraged his 
wife and daughter to interest themselves in helping the sick and 
needy in all parts of the town. 

He was very fond of children, and the grandchildren in his 
home found an advocate and friend. When boasting one day that 
the grandchildren always gave him instant obedience, a member 
of the family asked him the secret of his power, and he laughingly 
replied, "I am very careful never to ask them to do a thing which 
I am not sure they want to do." This tells in part the secret of 
his great power over men ; he studied them and was very careful 
not to ask a favor until he was reasonably sure of their willingness 
to comply with it. 

He was well versed in the maxim "that a man can be led, but 
not driven." During the autumn, when fruit was abundant, the 



508 APPENDIX. 

Seminary girls were given free access to the orchard and grapery 
of his private grounds to eat, and carry baskets full to their rooms. 
One fall he gave all the surplus fruit on his and the Seminary 
farm, and solicited from the farmers apples to the extent of several 
hundred bushels, which were distributed among the poor in 
Boston. 

He was full of fun and nothing suited him better than a good 
story. He had a strong aversion to committees. A few months 
before his death an organization was being effected in the Town 
Hall and a motion was made to appoint certain committees. Mr. 
Moody rose and said : " We don't want committees ; when you 
want anything done tell Mr. So and So to do it and you will 
accomplish something. One is enough to constitute any com- 
mittee. If there had been a committee appointed, Noah's Ark 
would never have been built." 

NO CUT AND DRIED PROGRAMME. 

When the summer conferences were in session, a committee 
was never known to make a programme. One evening in the 
summer of 1899, after devotionals, he rose and said : "I want 
fifty cents from every person present ; now don't look so glunr 
for I want to buy Tribunes to send to ministers. Dr. Shaw's- 
magnificent address must be placed in as many pastors' hands as 
possible. To-morrow morning Dr. Wilton Merle Smith will speak. 
He hasn't heard of it before, but this is a fairly good notice. In 
In the afternoon Rev. Mr. Torry will speak on ' Prayer.' " When 
asked for material for a sketch of his life he said : "I was born of 
the flesh in 1837. I was born of the Spirit in 1856. That which 
is born of the flesh may die. That which is born of the Spirit will 
live forever." 

Mr. Moody had the friendliest feeling toward the other 
churches and it is said that at the time the Catholic church was 
burned he contributed toward the rebuilding. Students from the 
Unitarian and Catholic churches have graduated from the schools 
without being disturbed in their religious faith. 

During one of the first conferences held in Northfield, a 



APPENDIX. 509 

minister was asked to speak who never had been there before. 
Knowing- that a Unitarian church was in the place, this man 
spoke at some length in criticism of that denomination. After the 
meeting was over a friend of Mr. Moody found him by himself 
in a very despondent frame of mind. Asking him what was the 
matter, Mr. Moody said: "I have tried to make my meetings 
attractive to the Unitarians so that they wonld come, not that I 
wish to proselyte, but I like to have them in my meetings. This 
man has kicked it all over by what he has said this morning ; 
there are Unitarians here this morning who will tell this through 
the town and they won't come here again." 

USE OF MEANS MUST GO WITH FAITH. 

Mr. Moody offered a gratifying contrast to many of his- 
cloth, especially revivalists, in his appreciation of regular medi- 
cine and antipathy for quacks. In speaking of a prominent 
Christian scientist, he praised medicine as the noblest of profes- 
sions after that of the ministry. "Never yet," he said, " in all 
my years of work have I called upon an able doctor, telling 
him of the sickness and need of some poor and friendless per- 
son, that he did not at once go to the rescue, without money 
and without price." " These are the men," he continued, "who 
are called devils by the faith healers." " God heals," he said, 
"through doctors and medicine. What do I do when I fall sick? 
Get the best doctor to be found, trust in him and trust in the 
Lord to work through him." This brief sketch of some 
characteristics of Mr. Moody as a citizen of Northfield, may 
indicate that this man of great works who could move multi- 
tudes, could also be interested in the welfare and prosperity of 
his native town. 

It is often said that great men shrink and grow smaller the, 
nearer we get to them. The very opposite can be said of 
Mr. Moody. The people of Northfield where he was known from 
boyhood had the highest appreciation of his sincerity, his public 
spirit and great ability. The town was simply transformed under 
the magic power of his touch. 



510 APPENDIX. 

The Secret of Mr. Moody's Greatness and How 

He Obtained It. 

BY REV. S. B. SHAW, 

Author of " Touching Incidents, and Answers to Prayer." 

f FIRST saw Mr. Moody in 1876. He was conducting a noon- 
day meeting at Farewell Hall. When I entered the room, I 

beheld a large number of clergymen on the platform and I 
said to a brother minister by my side : "Do you see that large man 
near the organ ? That is Mr. Moody." He replied, "How do you 
know, have you seen him before?" I replied, "No, but I can tell 
him; he looks as though he enjoyed more religion than any of the 
others." He smiled and said: "I guess you are right." Soon 
Mr. Mood}- arose and in an abrupt way said: "What would you 
think if you saw a man on the beach of the lake shivering with 
the cold, with a big fire near by, looking at it and saying, 'I wish 
I could get warm.' Why, you would say at once, 'Why don't you 
go to the fire and warm up?' " He then made a striking applica- 
tion by saying that many Christians were cold and lukew T arm with 
the fire of God all around them, and complained of their leanness 
and coldness when all the}' needed to do was to go to God and get 
warmed up. 

He preached that day from John 7: 37-40. He spake as one 
anointed of the Holy Ghost, and we believe that those who 
listened as if spellbound to his words felt that he spake as moved 
by the Spirit of God; and giving all due honor to his individu- 
ality, his zeal, his perseverance and his integrity, we only accept 
his own statement when we say that it was the baptism of the 
Holy Ghost that made him what he was. That baptism he re- 
ceived while in New York in 187 1. Multitudes both in Europe 
and America have heard him relate how he w r as led to feel his 
need of power and to seek definitely the experience. At one time 
he spoke as follows : 

"I can myself go back almost twenty years, and remember 
two hoi}' women who used to come to my meetings. It was de- 
lightful to see them there. When I began to preach, I could tell 



APPENDIX. 511 

by the expression of their faces that they were praying for me. 
At the close of the Sabbath evening meetings, they would say to 
me, 'We have been praying for you.' I said, 'Why don't you 
pray for the people?' They answered, ( You need the power.' 'I 
need power?' I said to myself; 'why, I thought I had the power.' 
I had a large Sabbath-school, and the largest congregation in 
Chicago. There were some conversions at that time. I was, in a 
sense, satisfied. But right along these two godly women kept 
praying for me, and their earnest talk about 'anointing for special 
service' set me thinking. 

CRY OF A BURDENED SOUL. 

"I asked them to come and talk with me, and we got down on 
our knees. They poured out their hearts that I might receive the 
anointing from the Holy Spirit, and there came a hunger into my 
soul. I did not know what it was. I began to cry as I never did 
before. The hunger increased. 

"Well, one da}', in the city of New York — ah, what a day! I 
cannot describe it; I seldom refer to it; it is almost too sacred an 
experience to name. Paul had an experience of which he never 
spoke for fourteen }^ears. I can only say that God revealed Him- 
self to me, and I had such an experience of His love that I had 
to ask Him to stay His hand. I went to preaching again. The 
sermons were not different; I did not present any new truths; and 
yet hundreds were converted. I would not now be placed back 
where I was before that blessed experience, if you would give me 
all Glasgow — it would be as the small dust of the balance. I tell 
you it is a sad day when a convert goes into the church, and that's 
the last you hear of him. If, however, you want this power for 
some selfish end, as, for example, to gratify your own ambition, 
you will not get it. 'No flesh,' says God, 'shall glory in my 
presence.' " 

The two godly women who were so greatly blessed to Mr. 
Moody were Airs. Sarah A. Cooke and Mrs. Carrie Jones, formerly 
Hawkhurst, names known to multitudes who have been quickened 
into higher life by their Christian example and efforts. 



512 APPENDIX. 

The following extract from a letter by Mrs. Cooke will be of 
interest to all readers : 

"Dear Brother S. B. Shaw: It was at the St. Charles camp- 
meeting in 1 87 1 that a burden came on me for Mr. Moody, that 
the Lord would give him the baptism of the Holy Ghost and of 
fire, a travail of soul deeper than I have ever had for any other 
being on God's earth. No opportunity after that was lost in urging 
upon him his great need, and encouraging him to seek with the 
certainty that it was for him also. 

UNSPEAKABLE JOY. 

"In my visits to Mr. Moody I was accompanied by Mrs. 
Hawkhurst, who enjoyed this great blessing, and had lately come 
to Chicago. After the sudden death of her husband, her home 
being gone, and almost heart-broken, she had come here to live 
with her only daughter. But soon Jesus came into her heart with 
a joy unspeakable and full of glory, and she would say as her feet 
trod the streets of Chicago on messages of love and mercy, it 
seemed as though they did not touch the sidewalk. At first, as we 
talked with Mr. Moody, there seemed no antagonism, but little 
conviction of his need of any further work ; but he asked us to 
meet with him in Farewell Hall every Friday afternoon, which we 
did for a number of weeks. As we met there from time to time, 
he would seem more in earnest, and the last Friday preceding our 
great Chicago fire in 187 1, he was intensely in earnest. This was 
during the month of October. 

"At each meeting, each of us prayed aloud with much earnest- 
mess, but at this meeting Mr. Moody's agony was so great that he 
rolled on the floor and in the midst of many tears and groans cried 
to God for deliverance from the carnel mind and to be baptized 
with the Holy Ghost. 

"After the great fire, he went to New York to solicit funds for 
the rebuilding of his institutions but he said his heart was not in 
it. The great cry of his soul was for the baptism of the Holy 
Ghost. While on Wall street it fell upon him just as on the first 
disciples and with the same glorious results." 



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